Compositions of Gold Coins minted in the Principality of Transylvania (II). The beginning of the new state [Ioan Zapolya (1538-1540) - Christophor Báthory (1576-1585)]

Ana Maria Velter1,
Gheorghe Niculescu2
Emanuel Petac3
1Romanian National History Museum, Bucharest, România
2National Laboratory for Researches in Conservation and Restoration of Movable National Cultural Heritage, Bucharest, România
3Library of the Romanian Academy

We continue by presenting our conclusions, after analyzing the metallic content of the golden coins from the Principality of Transylvania.

This time, thanks to the co-operation between the National Museum of History of Romania, the Numismatic Section of the Romanian Academy and the National Research Laboratory in the field of Preservation and Restoration of the National Mobile Cultural Property, it is a detailed research of the entire corpus of Transylvanian golden coins belonging to the "Eng. Constantin Orghidan" collection. We divided our research in three grand chapters, in accordance with the crucial stages of development of the Principality.

For the beginning, we present the metallic composition of the golden coins minted by the Principality of Transylvania during the first stages of its existence, more precisely from the establishment of the Principality until the War of Fifteen Years, starting with those minted during the reign of Ioan Zapolya (1538-1540) and finishing with those under the rule of Sigismond Báthory (1581-1597; 1598-1599; 1601-1602).

In this period there were five main coin issuers [John I Zapolya (1538-1540), John II Sigismund (1556-1571), Stephen Bathori (1571-1575), Christophor Báthori (1576-1585), Sigismund Báthori (1572-1613) 1581-1597; 1598-1599; 1601-1602)], and two Habsburg emperors that minted gold coins [Ferdinand I (1551-1556), Rudolph II (1572-1608)].