The trifollaro or trifollaris was a coppercoin minted in southern Italy under the Normans. It was worth 120 nummi or 3 folles.[1] 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 ("three new copper follares should be taken as one romesina") in Falco of Benevento's discussion of the currency reform of 1140 as a reference to a new denomination of coin.[2][3]
Count Roger I of Sicily (reigned 1071–1101) minted both folles and trifollari at Mileto. The latter are on average about three times as heavy as the former (10.6 to 3.4 grams). While the folles have a large Tau cross on them, the trifollari have an image of an armed equestrian figure. Philip Grierson argues that it is likely an image of the count made from life, since it has no identifiable model or parallel in contemporary art or sculpture. It is perhaps close in style to the contemporary Norman Bayeux Tapestry.[2]
Duke William II of Apulia minted trifollari at Mileto. Those minted around the time of William's investiture by Pope Paschal II in 1114 bear an equestrian effigy in imitation of those of Roger I. Later examples have a variety of different images: busts, stars, crosses, etc.[4]
In about 1184, King William II of Sicily began minting at Messina a trifollaro with a lion's face (or mask) on the obverse and a fruited date-palm on the reverse. This was a debased coin, much smaller than the trifollari minted a century earlier. The lion's face appears to be a copy of a Siculo-Punic coin minted at Messina in the fifth century BC—1500 years earlier. These may still have been in circulation in Messina in 1184. The date-palm may have been a symbol meant for William's Muslim subjects, since the Quran says Mary ate dates at the time of Jesus' birth.[5]
Grierson, Philip; Blackburn, Mark A. S.; Travaini, Lucia (1998). Medieval European Coinage. Vol. 14: Italy (III) (South Italy, Sicily, Sardinia). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Travaini, Lucia (1991). "Aspects of the Sicilian Norman Copper Coinage in the Twelfth Century". The Numismatic Chronicle. 151: 59–74.
William II, called the Good, was king of Sicily from 1166 to 1189. From surviving sources William's character is indistinct. Lacking in military enterprise, secluded and pleasure-loving, he seldom emerged from his palace life at Palermo. Yet his reign is marked by an ambitious foreign policy and a vigorous diplomacy. Champion of the papacy and in secret league with the Lombard cities, he was able to defy the common enemy, Frederick Barbarossa. In the Divine Comedy, Dante places William II in Paradise. He is also referred to in Boccaccio's Decameron.
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.
Byzantine currency, money used in the Eastern Roman Empire after the fall of the West, consisted of mainly two types of coins: the gold solidus and a variety of clearly valued bronze coins. By the end of the empire the currency was issued only in silver stavrata and minor copper coins with no gold issue.
An augustalis or augustale, also agostaro, was a gold coin minted in the Kingdom of Sicily beginning in 1231. It was issued by Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor and King of Sicily, and was minted until his death in 1250. In addition, a half augustalis was issued. It was identical in design, but smaller and half the weight. The augustalis bore a Latin inscription and was widely circulated in Italy. It was patterned after the Roman aureus. It was struck at Brindisi and Messina with accompanying billon deniers. The style of the augustalis has been described as splendid and proto-Renaissance; the quality of its execution and its fineness was high. The augustalis had a nominal weight of 5.31 grams and was 201⁄2 carats (854/1000) fine. The legal value was a quarter of a Sicilian gold ounce.
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.
Alfonso, also called Anfuso or Anfusus, was the Prince of Capua from 1135 and Duke of Naples from 1139. He was an Italian-born Norman of the noble Hauteville family. After 1130, when his father Roger became King of Sicily, he was the third in line to the throne; second in line after the death of an older brother in 1138. He was the first Hauteville prince of Capua after his father conquered the principality from the rival Norman Drengot family. He was also the first Norman duke of Naples after the duchy fell vacant on the death of the last Greek duke. He also expanded his family's power northwards, claiming lands also claimed by the Papacy, although he was technically a vassal of the Pope for his principality of Capua.
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.
Roger III was the eldest son of King Roger II of Sicily and Elvira of Castile. He was the Duke of Apulia from 1134 until his death.
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.
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.
A tarì was the Christian designation of a type of gold coin of Islamic origin minted in Sicily, Malta and Southern Italy from about 913 to the 13th century.
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.
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 Kingdom of Africa was an extension of the frontier zone of the Siculo-Norman state in the former Roman province of Africa, corresponding to Tunisia and parts of Algeria and Libya today. The main primary sources for the kingdom are Arabic (Muslim); the Latin (Christian) sources are scanter.
The Treaty of Villeneuve (1372) was the definitive agreement that ended the dispute between the House of Anjou and the House of Barcelona over the Kingdom of Sicily that began ninety years earlier in 1282. Its final form was approved by Pope Gregory XI in a bull issued at Villeneuve-lès-Avignon on 20 August 1372, and it was ratified by Queen Joan I of Naples and King Frederick IV of Sicily on 31 March 1373 at Aversa, in Joan's kingdom, in front of the papal legate, Jean de Réveillon, Bishop of Sarlat.
The Agontano was the currency used by the Italian Maritime Republic of Ancona from the 12th to the 16th centuries during its golden age. It was a large silver coin of 18-22mm in diameter and a weight of 2.04-2.42 grams, of roughly equivalent value to the Milanese Soldo.
Lucia Travaini is an Italian numismatist, archaeologist, and academic. She is Associate Professor of Medieval and Modern Numismatics at the University of Milan.
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).
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