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WESTPHALIA (KINGDOM)
This kingdom was established by Napoleon Bonaparte for his brother Jerome in western Germany. The Kingdom was established in 1807 and was returned to the original German states in 1813.
Coinage was issued under Jerome in two standarsd, the German in pfennig/thaler and the French in centimes/frank.
20 Franken - 1809-C
KM-033a - 6,45 g
Mintage 9.104
The obverse pictures a laureated bust of Jerome Napoleon (b1784-d1860). He was Napoleon Bonaparte's younger brother but was a failure as a military commander. He was exiled until 1847. Later he was President of the Senate and a Marshal of France. The Latin legend HIERONYMUS NAPOLEON. circles the bust. The designer's script name TIOLIER is below the bust. The reverse has the denomination 20 FRANK in the centre within a wreath. The German legend KOENIG V. WESTPH. FR. PR. circles the wreath at the top. The date 1809 is at the bottom flanked on the left by the eagle's hear privy mark and on the right by the mintmark C for the Kassel mint.
WÜRTTEMBERG
First recorded in 1081, Württemberg emerged as a political power out of the holdings of the Herren (Lords) von Wirdeberch in the area of the middle Neckar and the Remstal. After 1198 they profited from a dispute between the Staufers and the Guelphs and the collapse of the Hohenstaufen dynasty in the mid-13th century. They acquired a considerable amount of the Staufer territories. This circumstance brought them into conflict with the Habsburgs. In the late middle ages they strengthened their position and became the most important territorial power in southwest Germany. Among other acquisitions was the Grafschaft Moempelgard (Montbeliard); it remained until 1801. The family divided with one branch residing in Stuttgart and the other in Urach this weakened them and they lost their political influence. This period ended in 1482 when Graf Eberhard the Bearded, im Barte, who reigned 1459 to 1496, reunited the two parts. In 1496 Württemberg was elevated to an imperial fief, the Herzogtum Württemberg and Teck (Duchy of Württemberg). From 1520 to 1534 Württemberg was occupied by the Habsburgs. This ended with the return of the outlawed Herzog Ulrich who had reigned in 1498-1503 and 1519. Upon his return he reigned from 1534 to 1550 though Württemberg remained a fief of Habsburg until 1599. After the French revolution was a time of radical changes in both the territorial and political situation in Europe. Württemberg, which had been ruled by Herzog Friedrich II since 1797 in a absolutist manner, gave its support to Napoleon. It was one of the states which formed the Confederation of the Rhine under the protection of Napoleon (Rheinbund 1806 to 1813). Württemberg was rewarded by elevation to the position of a sovereign kingdom as well as a sizable increase in its territory. Among the additions were Heilbronn, Hohenloher Ebene, Ellwangen, Ulm, Rottweil, parts of Oberschwaben, the Allgaeu and the "vorderoesterreichischen Lande",parts of Austria. This increased the number of inhabitants from 650,000 to 1,340,000. In 1816 Württemberg became a member of the Deutschen Bund and a member of the Deutschen Zollverein since 1834. The attempt of King Wilhelm I, who reigned from 1816 to 1864, to give Württemberg a modern constitution failed initially, due to the resistance of the estates, but succeeded in 1819. After the suppression, in 1849, of the March Revolution of 1848, the royal government returned to a system of reaction. Württemberg formed a loose coalition with Habsburg against Prussia but became in a member of the Deutschen Reich in 1871. The last two decades of the 19th century were distinguished by increasing disputes between the newly formed Centre and Social Democratic parties and the question of the right to vote and a reform of the parliament. In 1918 after WWI the Republic of Württemberg was proclaimed and in 1919 a new democratic constitution come into force. The government was formed by a coalition of moderate parties. In 1933 Württemberg was "gleichgeschaltet", unified, as were all the German states.
20 Mark - 1894
KM-634 - 7,965 g
Nibtage
- 0,501M
The obverse bears the image of William II (b1848-d1921) surrounded by the German legend WILHELM II KING OF WUERTTEMBERG. Below the bust id the mint mark F for the Freudenstadt mint. The reverse features the German Imperial arms encircled by the German legend GERMAN EMPIRE, the year 1894, and, at the bottom, the denomination, 20 MARKS.
YEMEN
People have been living in the area known as Yemen for more than 3000 years. Ancient kingdoms earned their cash by selling scented tree resins known as myrrh and frankincense to the Egyptians, Greeks and Romans. Various states rose and fell along the trade routes; mightiest among them was Saba, which lasted for 14 centuries from 1000BC, and based its huge agricultural wealth around the famous dam of Ma'rib. When, in the 1st century AD, the Greeks and Romans discovered they could travel to and from India by boat, Yemen's ports profited, eclipsing the towns which had grown up along land trade routes. In 395 the Holy Roman Emperor Theodisius made Christianity the new state religion, effectively putting an end to the demand for frankincense and sending the Sabean kingdom into an irreversable decline. By 575 the Persians conquered the region. In the 7th century the Persian governor of Yemen converted to Islam. As the centre of Islamic power moved from the Arabian Peninsula to the Persian Gulf, Yemen was left more or less to its own devices, and a number of short-lived dynastic kingdoms sprang up. The Zaydi dynasty, a strict Islamic state founded in 897 in the north of the country, survived until Yemen's 1962 revolution. The Kathirids, who took power in the south in the 15th century, lasted until 1967. Portugal set up stations on the peninsula in 1513. Egypt's Mamluks and Turkey's Ottomans fought the Portugese and Yemen fell to the Ottomans. In 1636 they Zaydi dynasty threw the Turks out, but in 1839 the British took Aden and made it a protectorate, extending their rule over most of the south by the 1950s. The Ottomans returned in 1849, taking over the north-west of the country. The local sheiks refused to buckle under this foreign authority, and after decades of insurrection the Ottomans, already destroyed by WWI, left Yemen to its new king, Imam Yahya (although Britain still held on to its protectorate states). Although the Imam had control of the Tihama, Yemen's northern tribes were determined to have their own leader in power, and allied with the newly-formed state of Saudi Arabia. The 1934 Saudi-Yemeni war resulted in Saudi Arabia taking over Yemen's 'Asir region. Over the next 30 years Yemen remained isolated and underdeveloped - by the 1960s there were no paved roads in the country, almost no doctors and very low literacy levels. Throughout the 50s, Yemen indulged in several border scuffles with the Aden protectorate, eventually turning to Cairo for help. As part of its pact with Egypt, Yemen joined the United Arab States, made up of Egypt and Syria. In 1962, when the Imam died, a group of army officers held a coup and founded the Yemen Arab Republic. Forces loyal to the Imam's son fled to the northern mountains, where they attained the support of Britain and Saudi Arabia and waged war on the Republicans, supported by Egypt and the USSR. In 1967 the Egyptians pulled out, but the Royalists were unable to defeat the Republicans. In 1970 the Imam-in-waiting was exiled to Britain and the Yemen Arab Republic was recognised by Saudi Arabia. The National Liberation Front - a Marxist, nationalist guerilla group - began a war against the British in 1963. In 1967 the British abandoned Aden and the People's Republic of South Yemen was born. Without British cash, and with the recent closure of the Suez Canal, the new Republic was in dire economic straits. In order to get economic support from Communist countries it nationalised much of the economy and declared itself a Marxist state, changing its name in 1969 to the People's Democratic Republic of Yemen. Throughout the 70s, the two Yemens had border spats aplenty, as well as plenty of internal instability. In 1978 Lieutenant Colonel Ali Abdullah Saleh became president of the YAR, introducing a period of non-democratic stability that lasted through the 80s, while in the PDRY things got so bad that they ended up fighting a civil war with themselves in 1986. When the Soviet Union collap in 1991 the people of Yemen ratified a constitution which provided for free elections, a multi-party system and recognition of human rights. But power struggles between the two factions led to full-scale civil war in 1994. Although the southerners tried to, once again, found their own state, the northerners were too powerful and the country was eventually reunified under the leadership of President Saleh.
½ Dinar - 487 AH (1094 AD)
-
1,20 g
This coin was part of the Arwa Hoard discovered near DuJibla, Yemen in 1980. The coin was issued by Queen As-Sayyida Arwa (d1138 AD) in present-day Yemen. The central inscription reads: Al-Malik Al-Sayyid (the King, descendent of the Prophet); Al-Mukarum (the Great One); Al-Arab Sultan (ruler of the Arabs); Amir Al-Muminin (King Muminin). The inscription along the perimeter reads: In the Name of Allah, this Dinar was stuck in Du Jibla in the Islamic Year 487. The reverse has the legend There is but one God and the one God is Allah.
There are more Yemeni gold coins in this section if you are interested - Page Yemen 1
YUGOSLAVIA
Serbian tribes settled in the Balkans in the 7th century and were converted to Christianity by the Byzantine Empire. Serbia became the leading Slavic kingdom in the 14th century, under Stephen Dushan, who ruled most of the Balkan peninsula. The idea of a "Greater Serbia" dates back to that time. That independent kingdom came to an end on the fields of Kosovo, when the invading Ottoman Turks conquered the land in 1389 and held it for 500 years. Only in 1878 was Serbia strong enough to declare its independence. From the beginning, the notion of an ethnic Slavic country posed a threat to the other major power in the region, the multi-ethnic Austro-Hungarian Empire. As Serbia grew stronger and spread its influence in the Balkan Wars, conflicts with its neighbor grew, finally boiling over with the assassination of Austrian Archduke Franz Ferdinand by Serb nationalist Gavrilo Princip, which ignited World War I. When the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes -- Yugoslavia's first incarnation -- was founded at the end of the war, Serb leaders (especially Premier Nikola Pasic) thought the country was not a collection of equals, but a union of Southern Slavs under the protection and control of the Serbs, a role Serbia had earned because of its prior independence and military power. This enraged the Croatians and Macedonians, and left Yugoslavia in a continuous struggle until it collapsed under the German invasion at the beginning of World War II. This same conflict resurfaced at the end of World War II, with the creation of the second Yugoslavia under Marshall Josip Tito. Tito, however, was able to keep the ethnic rivalries in check by purging nationalists or playing them against each other. After Tito's death in 1980, this conflict came out into the open, with Serb nationalists arguing that Yugoslavia had always held their people back, while Croatian nationalists countered that the country was dominated by the Serbs at the expense of the other republics. The government's harsh suppression of ethnic Albanians in Kosovo in 1989 was the final straw that led the other republics to abandon Yugoslavia. The fighting -- brief in Slovenia, but vicious in Croatia and Bosnia -- dragged on for four years, finally grinding to a halt in October 1995 with the signing of a peace agreement in Dayton, Ohio. Serbia's campaign to "cleanse" Kosovo of rebellious ethnic Albanians did not stop, however, and it took the intervention of NATO forces to bring peace to the province. Yugoslavia now faces the daunting task of putting itself back together, but there are signs of progress. The new Serbian government is working on a power-sharing agreement with Kosovo. And Montenegro has committed to union with Serbia for at least the near future
1
Ducat - 1931
KM-012.2 - 3,49 g
Mintage
- 0,150M
This coin's obverse depicts King Alexander I (b1888-d1934) encircled by the Serbian inscription ALEXANDER I KING OF YUGOSLAVIA. King Alexander was assassinated during a state visit to Marseilles, France by an exiled Croat. The coin designer's name is below the bust. These coins were counterstamped with either a sword or a wheat corn for use in Bosnia or Serbia, constituent republics within the Yugoslav Federation. This one has the wheat counterstamp. The reverse has the arms of the Kingdom encircled with the Serbian inscription KINGDOM OF YUGOSLAVIA and the date. At the bottom is the denomination with Dukat in both Roman and Cyrillic characters.
There are more Yugoslav gold coins in this section if you are interested - Page Yugoslavia 1
ZUID AFRIKAANSCHE REPUBLIEK
In the 1830es, Boers had migrated from the Cape Colony into the interior to escape the hated British rule, and settled the area beyond the Vaal river. Having defeated the Zulu and Matabele, in 1839, they proclaimed the ZUID-AFRIKAANSCHE REPUBLIEK, and the republics of Lydenburg and Zoutpansberg. The British recognized the Zuidafrikaanse Republiek in 1852. The three republics merged into a unified Zuid Afrikaanse Republiek in 1857. The capital was established at Pretoria (founded 1855). The parliament, called Volksraad (people's council) had 24 members. In 1877, the republic, practically bankrupt, was annexed by Britain. In 1880, the Boers revolted, again proclaiming their independence. Invading British forces were defeated by the Boers in 1881 in the Battle of Majuba Hill. In 1886 gold was found at Witwatersrand near Johannesburg; it proved to be the world's richest gold deposit. Johannesburg boomed. In 1890, the tiny Boer republic of Klein Vrijstaat was incorporated into the Z.A.R.; in 1894 Swaziland was declared a protectorate of the Zuid-Afrikaanse Republiek. The Boers strictly separated the white Boer settlers from both the native African population and the miners and fortune hunters at Johannesburg, whom they regarded foreigners, denying both political participation. Cecil Rhodes, entrepreneur, prime minister of the Cape and colonial politician, provoked the Boer Wae (1899-1902) which resulted in the annexation of what the British called Transvaal by Britain in 1902.
£
1 - 1896
Y-019 - 8,80 g
Mintage
- 0,235M
This coin was issued by the South African Republic which was one of the Boer republics in South Africa. The obverse features a bareheaded bust of Oom Paul, the people's name for the President, Paul Kruger (b1825-d1904). Surrounding him is the Afrikaans legend for the country. The reverse features the arms of the ZAR with the denomination at the top left and the date at top right. The Boers were defeated in the War and, along with another Boer Republic, the Orange Free State, and the British colonies, were incorporated into the Union of South Africa in 1910.
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