Notae Numismaticae - Zapiski Numizmatyczne (14.2019)

MICHAŁ ZAWADZKI

Analyzing the images on the coins of Jagiełło, especially the Two-Barred Cross
under the crown, we can come to the conclusion that even small symbols located on
coin dies had a particular origin and significance. Those that were tied to the person
of the king and the symbolism of power were particularly important, and we cannot
say that they were arbitrary. In this context, we need to present one more uncertain
attribution, one that requires further consideration. Following Stanisława Kubiak,
it is currently believed that the Jagiellonian pennies with the symbol of a double
arch (principal) in the lower fields of the crown are the coins of Vladislaus III of
Varna (1434-1444). In adopting this view, Kubiak assumed, as mentioned above,
that Varna’s predecessor, Vladislaus Jagiełło, resumed the striking of coins at
the end of his life, in 1431, and that these were pennies of the group I/C, as well
as certain types of half-groschen. However, the production of these coins ended
in the second decade of the 15th century, and from the written sources we know,
however, that coins were struck at the end of Jagiello’s life - but which ones?
It would seem to be a mistake to believe that changes of this type - like the symbol
in the lower fields of the crown (fleurs-de-lis in a double arch) - would be tied to
the new ruler; in no way did this symbol identify the new king. It would seem that
we can explain the transformation of this symbol more accurately by pointing to
the need to differentiate this issue from other ones, especially if the earlier pennies
had been struck almost twenty years earlier. We can see yet another argument in
the large production of coins with a double arch - this had already been noticed by
Piekosiński, who, however, mistakenly attributed these coins to Casimir Jagiellon.38
In conclusion, the moment at which these pennies were struck almost certainly needs
to be moved to the end of Vladislaus Jagiello’s reign.39
Despite the various small modifications of a utilitarian nature that were made
to the 15th-century Crown coinage of the Polish Jagiellonian dynasty (the symbolic
changes gradually seem to become less important), the iconographic transformations
can, without a doubt, be described using the word immobilization. Immobilization
is clearly visible in the coinages of the neighboring states. The Prague groschen,
which was created at the beginning of the 14th century, was struck up until 1547.
Teutonic schillings - despite the fact that changes were made to their appearance

38 PIEKOSIŃSKI 1878: 105-106.
39 It was in a similar tone that S. Pawlikowski (2018: 40) expressed his opinion. However, the attribution that
he makes - that of Kubiak 1/27 - to the final period of Vladislaus Jagiello’s reign does not, at the present moment,
seem to be sufficiently justified, at least not until the order of the die reverses has been studied. These are rare coins
which, when it came to the unusually intense production of coins with arches, may have been an accidental variant.