Joan of Merwede held Gerdingen and Stein through inheritance from her father Willem van Merwede, making her one of the relatively few female lords issuing coinage in the Low Countries during the fifteenth century. Her minting rights were contested — small lordships of this type frequently faced pressure from larger neighbors, and the copper mite was the lowest practical denomination such a jurisdiction could strike while still asserting monetary authority over local markets.
The Lucas reference places this among a thin documentary record; the vdCh gap notation signals no die pairing has been firmly established in that corpus.
Joan of Merwede held Gerdingen and Stein through inheritance from her father Willem van Merwede, making her one of the relatively few female lords issuing coinage in the Low Countries during the fifteenth century. Her minting rights were contested — small lordships of this type frequently faced pressure from larger neighbors, and the copper mite was the lowest practical denomination such a jurisdiction could strike while still asserting monetary authority over local markets.
The Lucas reference places this among a thin documentary record; the vdCh gap notation signals no die pairing has been firmly established in that corpus.