Muraiola of 4 Baiocchi - Pius VI

Pius VI's reign was the longest of any pope in the eighteenth century, and the muraiola series reflects the chronic monetary dysfunction of the Papal States throughout that stretch. The billon coinage circulated alongside a bewildering tangle of copper, silver, and debased issues, with exchange rates between denominations subject to periodic papal edict rather than market logic. The baiocco system itself was notoriously resistant to reform — successive attempts to rationalize it in the 1770s and 1780s foundered on the competing interests of the Roman financial guilds and the Camera Apostolica.

Pius VI's pontificate ended in French captivity; he died in Valence in 1799, a prisoner of the Directory.