Obole

The Bishops of Geneva exercised temporal coinage rights throughout the medieval period, a privilege repeatedly contested by the counts of Savoy, whose territorial ambitions brought them into sustained conflict with episcopal authority over the city. The fourteenth century saw that tension peak, with coinage serving as a deliberate assertion of jurisdictional independence rather than mere commercial necessity.

The obole, as the half-denier fraction, circulated primarily in small local transactions and alms-giving contexts where full deniers were impractical. At this weight, attrition was rapid.