An augustalis or augustale, also agostaro, was a gold coin minted in the Kingdom of Sicily beginning in 1231. [1]
An augustalis or augustale, also agostaro, was a gold coin minted in the Kingdom of Sicily beginning in 1231. [1]
It was issued by Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor (from 1220) and King of Sicily (from 1198), and was minted until his death in 1250. [2] [3] In addition, a half augustalis was issued. It was identical in design, but smaller and half the weight. [4] The augustalis bore a Latin inscription and was widely circulated in Italy. It was patterned after the Roman aureus. [5] It was struck at Brindisi and Messina with accompanying billon deniers. [5] The style of the augustalis has been described as splendid and proto-Renaissance; the quality of its execution and its fineness was high. [5] The augustalis had a nominal weight of 5.31 grams and was 201⁄2 carats (854/1000) fine. [4] The legal value was a quarter of a Sicilian gold ounce. [4]
The obverse contains a classical (not medieval) profile bust of the emperor wearing a laureate wreath with the legend CESAR AVG IMP ROM (Caesar Augustus, Emperor of the Romans); the reverse shows an eagle, the imperial symbol, with the name FRIDE RICVS (Frederick). [6] [4] The name augustalis means literally "of the august one", referring to the coin's provenance from the emperor himself, but also linking it with the Roman Emperor, who was commonly styled Augustus.
Roger III, of the House of Hauteville, was the eldest son and heir of King Tancred of Sicily and Queen Sibylla. He was made Duke of Apulia, probably in 1189, shortly after his father's accession. In the summer of 1192 he was crowned co-king with his father. Follari were minted at Messina bearing both Tancred and Roger's names as kings.
The follis was a type of coin in the Roman and Byzantine traditions.
Charles IV, Duke of Anjou, also Charles of Maine, Count of Le Maine and Guise, was the son of the Angevin prince Charles of Maine, Count of Maine and Isabelle of Luxembourg-Saint-Pol.
James IV of Majorca, also known as Jaume IV, unsuccessfully claimed the thrones of the Kingdom of Majorca and the Principality of Achaea from 1349 until his death. He was also king consort of Naples, without any role in its government.
Peter II was the King of Sicily from 1337 until his death, although he was associated with his father as co-ruler from 1321. Peter's father was Frederick III of Sicily and his mother was Eleanor, a daughter of Charles II of Naples. His reign was marked by strife between the throne and the nobility, especially the old families of Ventimiglia, Palizzi and Chiaramonte, and by war between Sicily and Naples.
Tancred of Hauteville, the second son of King Roger II of Sicily and his first wife, Elvira of Castile, was the Prince of Bari and Taranto from 1132 to 1138.
Richard III, also known as Richard of Caleno, was the Norman count of Carinola and last quasi-independent Duke of Gaeta, ruling from 1121 to his death. From 1113, he was regent of Gaeta for his cousin or nephew, Duke Jonathan; in 1121 he succeeded him. As duke he was a nominal vassal of the Princes of Capua, to whom he was related.
Eleanor of Anjou was Queen of Sicily as the wife of King Frederick II of Sicily. She was a member of the Capetian House of Anjou by birth.
Jonathan, a member of a cadet branch of the Drengot family, was the Duke of Gaeta from 1113 until his death. He is known from the Codex Caietanus to have been in the fourth year of his minority in 1116 and the seventh of his rule in 1119. There are three theories of his paternity. He may have been the son of Count Jonathan I of Carinola or his grandson by an unnamed son, or else the grandson of Count Bartholomew of Carinola. He was under the regency of his cousin or uncle, Count Richard of Carinola.
Lu rebellamentu di Sichilia, fully Cronica di lu rebellamentu di Sichilia contra re Carlu, is a Sicilian historical chronicle of the War of the Vespers written around 1290. The anonymous Rebellamentu, probably written at Messina, was ascribed to Atanasiu di Iaci by Pasquale Castorina in 1883. Though the Rebellamentu sometimes adds valuable details to the history of the Vespers, it is frequently untrustworthy. Its monastic provenance is evident in its moralising tone. The antiquity of its language has placed its authenticity beyond doubt, despite its lack of an early manuscript tradition. This has not prevented speculation that it was written contemporarily with events: one verb in one manuscript is found in the first-person present; this may represent the author inadvertently stepping out of his usual frame of reference, or merely an error in that manuscript.
Fulco of Basacers was an Italo-Norman knight and landholder with considerable possessions in the Val di Crati in Calabria. The seat of his lordship was "Brahalla", a place or castle that no longer exists.
Manso was a Lombard viceduke (vicedux) who ruled the Duchy of Amalfi during the reign of Roger Borsa, the Norman Duke of Apulia. He is known only from his coins: large, copper follari bearing the inscription MANSO VICEDUX on the reverse. Irregular and poor in quality, mostly overstrikes of Salernitan coins, they were originally attributed to Manso of Salerno (981–83).
Landulf of Conza, a Lombard nobleman, was briefly Prince of Benevento in 940 and then briefly Prince of Salerno in 973. The son of Atenulf II of Benevento, Landulf ruled on his father's death (940) as co-prince with his uncle, Landulf I, who soon sent him into exile. He initially took refuge at the court of Marinus II of Naples, from where he sought shelter in Salerno through his sister, Gaitelgrima, the second wife of Prince Guaimar II of Salerno. This he received and he was soon appointed gastald of Conza, while his sons—Landenulf, Landulf, Indulf, and Guaimar—were invested with land in Salerno. The Chronicon Salernitanum, which is the most important source for Landulf's life, names the counties of Marsi, Sarno, and Lauro as those of Guaimar, Indulf, and Landenulf, respectively, but does not name a county for Landulf.
Italy has a long history of different coinage types, which spans thousands of years. Italy has been influential at a coinage point of view: the medieval Florentine florin, one of the most used coinage types in European history and one of the most important coins in Western history, was struck in Florence in the 13th century, while the Venetian sequin, minted from 1284 to 1797, was the most prestigious gold coin in circulation in the commercial centers of the Mediterranean Sea.
The gigliato, also gillat or carlino, was a coin of pure silver established in 1303 by Charles II of Anjou in Naples, and then also in Provence from 1330. Its name derives from the Lilies ("giglio") depicted on the reverse entwined around a cross. The coin weighed 4 grams. This type of coin was widely copied in the Eastern Mediterranean, especially by the Turks, such as the Emir of Saruhan.
The trifollaro or trifollaris was a copper coin minted in southern Italy under the Normans. It was worth 120 nummi or 3 folles. The name trifollaro, used by scholars, was coined by the Italian numismatist Rodolfo Spahr. Contemporary sources do not use the name. Spahr interpreted the phrase tres follares aereos romesinam unam appretiatos in Falco of Benevento's discussion of the currency reform of 1140 as a reference to a new denomination of coin.
Lucia Travaini is an Italian numismatist, archaeologist, and academic. She is an Associate Professor of Medieval and Modern Numismatics at the University of Milan.
Events during the year 1190 in Italy.
Medieval European Coinage is a book series on medieval coins published by Cambridge University Press in association with the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge. The project was the idea of professor Philip Grierson (1910-2006) and Mark Blackburn (1953-2011) was the first general editor. It will cover the coinages of Europe for the period c.450-1500. It has been described as the "first comprehensive survey of European medieval coinages since the Traité de numismatique du moyen âge of Engel and Serrure" (1891-1905).
The pierreale was a silver coin minted by the Kingdom of Trinacria (Sicily) between the reigns of Peter I (1282–1285) and Ferdinand II (1479–1516). It was equivalent in weight and fineness to the Neapolitan carlino and was sometimes called a carlino. It carried on the obverse the imperial eagle, the favoured emblem of the Staufer dynasty of Peter I's queen, Constance II, and on the reverse the arms of Aragon, representing Peter's native kingdom. The design deliberately contrasted with that of the carlino. After Alfonso I's conquest of Naples in 1442, he replaced the arms with an image of the seated ruler and replaced the eagle with the quartered arms of Aragon and Naples.
The augustalis continued to be struck in the regno throughout the rest of the reign, and was even continued by later kings.
Sambon and others have supposed that augustales in Frederick's name continued to be issued [by his successors] down to 1266, which is possible but unsupported by positive evidence.
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