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AURUM.
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name,
on the reverse; the type of the obverse being their patron the Baptist;
the coin, "la lega suggellata dal Battista." The great Italian cities
were to the last honourably jealous about the purity of their gold
coinage. Dante finds Maestro Adamo plunged very low in the realms of
torment for having forged florins containing merely 3 carats of alloy
(the present French standard nearly), at the instigation of the Counts
of Romena, who thus made a profit of 12-1/2 per cent, by the
falsification. (Inf. xxx.)
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Our present standard, though now the
highest used in Europe (on which account the Italian goldsmiths eagerly
buy up our sovereigns to melt for their filigree-work, often at a
higher rate than the course of exchange), dates strangely enough from
the first attempt of Henry VIII. to tamper with the gold coinage; and
this not before his 36th year, when he ventured to add 2 carats of
alloy to the standard, ever before pure—a great national boast. Even Ms audacity
advanced no further than the addition of 2 carats more in his last
year, that time of bankruptcy. This last standard of 20 carats was
used for the first mintage of his son ; but in his second he restored
the fine for his sovereigns and angels, but retained that of 22
for all his other pieces—a rule never subsequently altered. The
sovereign (or 30-shilling piece) continued of fine gold until its
extinction under James I., as did the angel down to its last appearance
in the reign of his unfortunate successor.
No European nation can at present boast of a coinage in fine gold,
though down to the close of the last century such was largely minted in
the Venetian and Papal zecchins, and the Dutch and Austrian ducats. The
credit of maintaining to the last this ancient glory of the mint most
fittingly rests with Florence, and with its late worthy and
much-to-be-pitied Grand Duke Leopoldo, whose ruspone (20-dollar
piece), a magnificent coin, equalling in beauty of execution its
intrinsic purity, was issued, though sparingly, within my own
recollection. For the new-stamped " Kingdom of Italy," the French
standard of one-tenth alloy (for both metals) has been adopted; and the
same
I
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