Catalog
See full images - free registration
Continue with Google - no registration!
or register with email
Why register? Just to keep bots out of our catalog. Your email stays private - we will never share it or send you anything uninvited. We guarantee you that!
Saluto d'Argento - Charles II
| Issuer | Kingdom of Naples |
|---|---|
| Year | 1285-1302 |
| Type | Standard circulation coin |
| Value | Log in to see details |
| Currency | Log in to see details |
| Composition | Log in to see details |
| Weight | Log in to see details |
| Diameter | Log in to see details |
| Thickness | Log in to see details |
| Shape | Log in to see details |
| Technique | Log in to see details |
| Orientation | Log in to see details |
| Engraver(s) | Log in to see details |
| In circulation to | Log in to see details |
| Reference(s) | Log in to see details |
| Obverse description | Central field displays a large quartered heraldic shield divided per pale, bearing on the dexter side the Jerusalem cross (a large cross potent accompanied by four smaller crosslets) and on the sinister side three fleurs-de-lis arranged two and one, representing the Angevin claim to the Kingdom of Jerusalem and the French royal arms respectively. The shield is rendered in high relief with a pointed base in the Gothic style. The entire design is enclosed within a beaded inner circle, with the royal legend running continuously in Gothic lettering between the beaded border and the outer rim. |
|---|---|
| Obverse script | Log in to see details |
| Obverse lettering | ✠ KAROL'· SCD' · IЄRL'· ЄT · SICIL' · RЄX (Translation: Charles the Second, King of Sicily and Jerusalem) |
| Reverse description | Log in to see details |
| Reverse script | Log in to see details |
| Reverse lettering | Log in to see details |
| Edge | Log in to see details |
| Mint | Log in to see details |
| Mintage | Log in to see details |
| Additional information |
Charles II of Anjou struck this issue while simultaneously navigating one of the most punishing political settlements of the medieval Mediterranean: the War of the Sicilian Vespers, which had erupted in 1282 and stripped the Angevins of Sicily itself, leaving Naples as the rump of what had been a unified kingdom. The saluto d'argento denomination took its name from the Annunciation type, linking dynastic legitimacy to Marian devotion at a moment when the Angevins badly needed both divine and papal sanction.
Charles spent much of this reign as a prisoner of Aragon — captured at the Battle of the Gulf of Naples in 1284 — and did not actually rule in his own right until 1288.