Medieval Livonian Numismatics
by William Urban
Medieval coins provide a tangible means of making contact with our past. In them we see part of the culture of former generations--its art, trade, politics, even its human dimension. In them we see important clues to economic and social history in the centuries before written sources became common. However, numismatics is not an easy subject to master. What seems simple and straightforward on the surface may actually be fairly complex when one investigates deeper. For example, studies of the origins of coins from the eighth to the eleventh centuries prove that in that era the Baltic peoples were to a certain extent mediators between East and West; however, archeological excavations of a later era demonstrate the existence of "two economies" and "two cultures," one essentially Hanseatic and mercantile in nature, the other rural and agricultural.(1) To one looking for evidence that the crusaders disrupted and set back the cultures of the Baltic peoples, this evidence seems damning. To others these studies indicate that the common man made little or no regular use of coins at any time before the fifteenth century and that at all times there were classes which found coins indispensable for trade and adornment. In short, the numismatic evidence concerning the past remains under discussion still today. Moreover, any study of medieval Livonia which fails to take into account the numismatic evidence, ignores an important source of knowledge about the era.
The origin of the earliest coins
Coins began to circulate through the Baltic region as early as the Roman era.(2) Presumably these were used for the purchase of amber. Since coins had no value as currency per se, we assume that Baltic peoples valued them as jewelry, prized their raw silver content, and deposited them in graves so that the deceased could pay the entrance fee into the underworld. Later, Vikings making the journey between the Baltic and Black Seas spent some of their money in Livonia; others buried their money for safekeeping and did not live to dig it up.(3) Even later German-speaking rulers and their subjects saved those coins which had highest percentage of silver content and passed on as best they could debased coins. (Economists call this Gresham's Law, though it was expounded by Copernicus for the Assembly of the Prussian Estates in the fifteenth century.) The practice of hiding valuable coins for safekeeping was the origin of many of the hoards which have been discovered in modern times by farmers, hunters, and archeologists.
The most numerous early medieval hoards are those left by Vikings.(4) These contained Frankish coins, presumably gathered by trade with or raids on the Carolingian empire, British coins collected as booty or Danegelt, and Moslem coins obtained from the sale of slaves or earned as mercenaries' wages. Later, German and Scandinavian merchants based on Gotland exchanged western silver coins for native goods.(5)
Unfortunately, many of the hoards were discovered before the principles of modern archeology and numismatics were established, so the finders saw nothing wrong in selling the coins to collectors or even melting them down for bullion. Even today hoards find their way onto the market without any indication of their provenance or a complete inventory. This presents serious problems to historians and numismatists, who know that they cannot dismiss the evidence provided by coins now in collections but do not have a procedure for evaluation as satisfactory as they do for cataloging newly-found hoards.
Livonian Pennies
The first coins were struck in the city of Riga in the early thirteenth century.(6) The contending political forces there had asked a papal legate to define the terms of Gotland law by which the bishop governed the city. As part of the settlement, he decreed that any coins minted would conform to the Gotland system (1 Silver Mark = 8 uncos (Oere, or ounces)(7) = 24 Ortug = 288 Silver pennies [1728 actual penny coins]).(8) The legate's choice was a logical one. However, the majority of coins brought to the Baltic by German merchants (who later formed the Hanseatic League) were based on the Cologne penny, which corresponded to the standard of the widely used English penny and was favored by the merchants of Lübeck.(9)
In the course of the century Gotland merchants lost their dominant position in trade and their monetary system lost popularity correspondingly. Moreover, just before the beginning of the fourteenth century the archbishop and citizens of Riga found themselves at war with the Livonian Order. Certainly the Master (Landmeister) of the Order would have attempted to undermine his enemies at their weakest point--their money. Although the matter does not appear in the surviving correspondence, the master must have restricted the use of Rigan pennies while encouraging the use of Hanseatic coins. Even before these Cologne weight pennies came to dominate the market, the archbishops could not have made a significant profit from minting their own pennies; afterward, there was no point to minting them at all.(10)
Archeological excavations suggest that coins were used almost exclusively in cities. The lack of coins discovered in rural excavations suggests that Estonian and Latvian farmers lived in an essentially separate economy from the German-speaking artisans and merchants of the towns.(11) We do know that after farmers had delivered their grain, honey, furs, and other goods for sale or payment of taxes, the transaction was recorded in Marks (the most common Mark, that of Cologne, was about one-half an English pound) and Pennies. However, payment of debts in rural districts (even among rural nobles and merchants) was usually made in silver bars (which provided a more dependable silver content than coins) and wire money (which could be clipped to create small change). This ancient Russian monetary system was supplemented by the use of a variety of foreign coins whose value had to be guessed.
The diversity of coins circulating in Livonia presented everyone difficulties in determining the true worth of each coin. This was true not just because the competing coinage systems had pennies of differing weights, but also because so many rulers debased their coins by stamping out more pennies per Mark or adding copper.(12) The public protected itself against short weight (and clipping the edges of coins) by using small scales (which archeologists have found in many graves),(13)
but it was more difficult to determine the silver content (the usual test was to bite the coin). The early pennies (or denare) used in Livonia were usually bracteats (pronounced Brak Tee Ats). So thin that they were often called a Dünnpfennig, the coin was stamped on only one side, but the image could be seen (and felt) on the reverse as well. Often the artistic quality of bracteats was quite high, especially the early ones which were the size of a German five-Mark piece (somewhat larger than an American quarter). However, by the thirteenth century these pennies had become so small that contemporaries called them "cleynen pfennigen." Although they served well as small change, merchants found counting so time-consuming that they usually resorted to weighing any large quantity of coins. Soon their popularity was challenged by Lübeck hohlpfennige worth four Rigan pennies. About the size of an American dime and somewhat thicker than bracteats, this hohlpfennig was sometimes called a Dickpfennig. The Teutonic Knights may have sent the first of the bracteats and hohlpfennige from Prussia to the Livonian Knights. Unfortunately, none of the numerous coins of these types can be dated.(14)
The second local site where bracteats (denare) were minted was in Reval, then ruled by Denmark.(15) In the 1320's the Gotland Ortug (worth twelve bracteats) and the Lübeck penny acquired such popularity that the smaller Livonian coins practically disappeared from circulation. Reacting to the demand for a larger coin, the Bishop of Dorpat issued an Artiger(16) (1 Silver Gotland Mark = 24 theoretical Artigers = 156 Artigers in coin)(17) between 1346 and 1373. This was a true coin in the modern sense, stamped with the symbols of bishop's authority, a cross and crosier (bishop's staff) on one side and either a portrait or a coat of arms on the other. Apparently, this was a popular coin in Estonia: numerous copies survive and about 1360 the Teutonic Knights in Reval issued their own copy.(18) A third site of minting small pennies was Goldingen in Kurland.(19)
Numismatists believe that these are to be identified with ten otherwise anonymous coins unearthed in Kurland.
The popularity of these coins is demonstrated by their appearance in records and hoards from Finland, Sweden, Novgorod, and Pskov. As the Livonian coins declined in quality over the years, those states responded to the crisis by minting their own coins.(20) This spurred the Livonian rulers to put their house in order.
The first effort to coordinate the Livonian coinage occurred about 1390 with the minting of Lübeck-style pennies in Reval and Dorpat. The Order's coins were two-sided: there was an Order's shield on one side, a small cross on the other; but it lacked any indication of the date of issue. The bishop's coin was equally anonymous, displaying only the crosier and sword of Dorpat.(21) These coins (and a copper bracteat) appeared just before the bishop and the master entered into a long contest, partly military in nature, over the diocese's desire to remain politically sovereign and separate from the rest of Livonia.(22) As a result of this dispute, further efforts to coordinate the coinage had to wait until 1420, when the master proposed a two year suspension in minting coins.(23)
Livonian Schillings
In 1422 legislation at the Assembly (Landtag) of the Livonian Confederation(24) authorized the introduction of a strengthened Artiger (worth 12 pennies) which was soon known as a Schilling.(25)By 1426 the Archbishop of Riga had begun to issue coins again (he may have begun this as early as 1424) and the master had issued a Schilling bearing his name.(26) The Schilling met the needs of a developing economy: merchants needed a coin which would eliminate the need to carry vast quantities of small coins. The mintmasters must have been pleased, too. Not only would they have shared in the income, but they had more opportunity to display their artistic talents; they could emboss the larger Schillings with more elaborate detail than they could Artigers and Pennies.(27)
The traditional Schilling issued by the Livonian Order bore a cross (long or short) on one side and a coat of arms on the other, with an inscription around the border giving the master's name and his abbreviated title on one side and the name of the city of issue on the other. It is surprising that coats of arms appear, since the Teutonic Knights had not inscribed them on Prussian coins despite the international prestige of the Grandmasters. We assume that the masters used their personal coats of arms after 1471 because their claims to political leadership in Livonia had been so often challenged by the archbishop and the citizens of Riga and because in an earlier period the masters had been appointed by the Grandmasters in Prussia. The coat of arms was a sign of sovereignty.(28)
The Schillings vary slightly within each issue. Minters literally struck each individual coin, using a hammer to flatten heated silver between two dies. They set one die in a platen (in a depression) and mounted the other on an heavy punch. If they struck the silver even the slightest bit off-center, they would produce oblong coins. Though naturally reluctant to restrike coins, they had a good feel for the amount of variation the mintmaster would allow. This means that the quality of the inscription around the edge of the coin varies considerably. Often one part of the inscription is clear and crisp, the opposite part almost illegible. As minters wore out their dies, they cut new ones. Thus, each die varied slightly from its predecessors, especially in the inscriptions.
The Schilling was a response to local economic needs. Livonian grain was making its way to the west in greater quantity than before. The forest products (honey, wax, wood, fur) and amber were in demand. For the first time, Livonia may have had a trade surplus and thus been able to keep silver from flowing out of the country. In addition, the traditional Russian trade in fur and honey (by sea and river during the summer, and by sled in the winter), was being expanded to include regions ruled by pagan Lithuanians. As native Livonians and feudal lords acquired hard cash, they became accustomed to paying their taxes and buying goods with coins rather than with dry exchange (a rough estimate of the worth of goods in monetary units, which was then translated into credit or commodities). As inflation caused prices everywhere to rise, merchants and government officials found that calculating payment in Schillings was much more convenient than counting piles of smaller coins. However, the Schilling soon suffered from inflation and debasement due to a pan-European shortage of silver. As a result, by 1450 it was so strongly challenged by the popularity of a new Penny that its issuance was interrupted for several years.(29)This Pfennigzeit came to an end in 1471, but the temptation to stretch the available silver by using less of it in each coin remained strong; consequently, the debasement of the currency continued. Within a century, the Groschen (worth three debased Schillings) became so numerous that they were counted as in a "schock" of sixty pieces. The result was the issuance of ever-larger denominations of coins.(30)
Such has been the fascination of numismatists and historians with the larger denominations of coins which possessed coats-of-arms and the names of the rulers that until recently they overlooked the existence of small change. Yet fractional coins were as necessary to the economy as the larger coins. The 1426 Assembly authorized the minting of the Scherf (1/2 a Lübeck penny), which is sometimes called a Seestling.(31) This was, in effect, a resurrection of the hohlpfennig.
Larger coins
The Livonian Order may have hoped to base the regional currency on the Prussian model(32)once it had unified Livonia. However, this ambition failed and the visible sign of the failure was the fact that every political unit in Livonia began to issue coins of its own. After 1426 the archbishop, the bishops, and the cities began stamping coins which varied significantly from the Prussian system: a Vierchen worth four-pence; Ducats (based on Italian models and equal to one Mark) and Gulden (based on Hungarian and Rhenish coinage) to provide a gold standard which could be reckoned at one-twelfth of silver weight; a Double Schilling (Doppelschilling), a Ferding, a Dreigroschen, and other uncommon coins.(33)
Thus, the chaotic currency of late medieval Livonia is a reflection of the political diversity: the Assembly found it almost impossible to agree upon anything, but it was especially impossible to achieve uniformity in the silver content of coins. The Livonian Confederation spent much time debating currency matters, but never resolved their difficulties for long. In fact, their efforts to establish a firm price for silver were doomed to failure because precious metals became scarcer (and the price became more unstable) after 1440. By 1524 Reval merchants had become so accustomed to using more numerous and reliable Swedish coins that they began minting them themselves!(34)
In the sixteenth century silver became more common, thanks to new mines in Europe and the looting of Mexico. Like other contemporaries, the Livonians issued a heavy silver coin, the thaler (taler), to replace the one mark pieces. This coin was the culmination of early modern technology as applied to minting. The thaler had the heft and feel of a valuable object and the beauty of a work of art. The Plettenberg-Thaler of 1525 was the first Renaissance or modern coin struck in the Baltic.(35)
Even so money remained precious. The Moscovite invasion of 1558 which began the Livonian War followed long negotiations with Ivan IV over the amount of tribute the Livonians should pay for an extension of the truce. The Livonians repeatedly argued that they could not raise the one Mark for every inhabitant which the Tsar demanded. At last, they reached a compromise, 40,000 Thalers. But when the Tsar sent for the money, the Livonians had to admit they had not brought that amount with them. Within a year, after the initial Russian military successes made the Livonians aware of their danger, they managed to raise 60,000 Thalers with great effort and send them to Moscow. Too late. The Tsar sent the tribute back and dispatched more armies into Livonia.(36) When the Livonian Order found itself unable to pay its mercenaries promptly in hard cash, it suffered repeated betrayals and defeats. The result was the division of Livonia between Poland and Sweden. Although Riga continued to issue coins, and the Duke of Kurland introduced his mintage, this cannot disguise the fact that, when one considers the numismatic evidence, the medieval Livonian World had come to an end.
1. This does not mean that the native people were unacquainted with coinage between the twelfth and fifteenth centuries, but that they found other systems of exchange (wire money, silver bars, barter) more practical. Nor does it mean that long distance trade in the Viking era had a significant impact on every village in the lands of what is today Estonia and Latvia.
2. Joan Fagerlie, Late Roman and Byzantine Solidi Found in Sweden and Denmark (New York, 1967) [American Numismatic Society Numismatic Notes and Monographs 157].
3. The basic theories explaining why hoards existed at all are based on the belief that the coinowners had nothing better to do with their money than to bury it for safekeeping until an opportunity arose to spend it. This leads to complications when one tries to explain why hoards are NOT found in some areas. One explanation is that no coins existed in that region--it was economically backward, or too dangerous for travelers, or other routes were more suited for travel. An equally good explanation is that rich people invested their coins rather than hiding them.
4. Thomas Noonan's articles in the JBS provide the best descriptions of these dirham hoards. He is currently the recipient of a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities to compile the information from previous studies into a Catalog of Dirham Hoards from Western Eurasia, 700-1100.
Also, see Viking-Age Coinage in the Northern Lands (ed. M.A.S. Blackburn and D.M. Metcalf. 2 vols. Oxford, 1981) [BAR International Series, 122]; and Commentationes de Nummis Saeculorum IX-XI in Suecia Repertis (ed. N.L. Rasmusson and L.O. Lagerqvist. 2 vols. Stockholm, 1961, 1968) [Kungl. Vitterhets Historie och Antikvitets Akademiens Handligar, Antikvariska Serien 9 and 19].
5. Arkadi Mongovin, "Die auswärtigen Verbindungen Estland in der zweiten Hälfte des 12. Jh. und im ersten Viertel des 13. Jh. im Lichte der Numismatic," Zeitschrift für Archeologie, 12(1973), 205-210, indicates extensive contacts between Livonia and Gotland, but with some indications that coins came directly from Westphalia. The Lithuanian grand duchy had its own coinage, separate and distinct from the coastal traditions. See Alexander Rackus, Cyclopedia of Lithuanian numismatics (Chicago: Balzekas Museum of Lithuanian Culture, 1965), and Jonas Karys, Senoves lietuviu pinigai, istorija ir numizmatika (Putnam, Connecticut: Aukselis, 1959).
6. Michail Nemirowitsch-Dantschenko and Franziskus Pärn, "Seestlinge und Scherfe, ein Beitrag zur Münzgeschichte Livlands," (hereafter N-D & P) 61-2; further citations to the literature will be found in footnote 10 of Franziskus Pärn's "Das Münzwesen des Deutschen Ordens," Der Deutsche Orden in Livland (ed. Norbert Angermann. in press). I wish to acknowledge Mr. Pärn's generous assistance in sending me his yet-unpublished manuscript.
7. In the Cologne Mark the translation of this word as ounce would be more correct than in the Gotland Mark. The reader must remember that even today we must specify what type of ounce is used for weight (Troy [5760 grains] or Avoirdupois [7000]); in the medieval world this was much more complex.
8. Liv-, Esth,-, und Curländisches Urkundenbuch (ed. F. G. von Bunge. Dorpat, 1853), I, 81-2: "Monetam autem in civitate fieri ciuscunque formae, sit in potestate domini episcopi, dum tamen eiusdem bonitatis sit et ponderis, cuius est moneta Gotorum seu Gutlandiae." December of 1225. Previous, in 1211, this right had been given to Gotland merchants. Urkundenbuch, I, 27-8; Beda Franz Dudik, Des Hohen Deutschen Ritterordens Münzsammlung (Vienna, 1858. Rpt. in Quellen und Studien zur Geschichte des Deutschen Ordens, vol. 6. Bonn: Wissenschaftliches Archiv, 1966), 123; for many years it was believed that this was a fictious coinage, used solely for calculations. However, the 1968 excavations of St. Mary's in Riga uncovered coins which appear to date from this era. A few coins from the end of the century resembling the later coins from Dorpat came to light as well. For more information and for the calculation of the number of pennies minted, see Pärn, "Das Münzwesen."
9. Lübeck citizens received special privileges in Riga, beginning in 1231. Urkundenbuch, I, 144-6; minters stamped 720 pennies from each Mark of silver, and although the Cologne (Kölnisch) Mark occasionally weighed as little as 229 grams (in modern weight), it was usually a dependable 233.8 grams. A. Luschin von Ebengreuth, Allgemeine Münzkunde und Geschichte des Mittelalters und der neueren Zeit (München: Oldenbourg, 1969), 163-70; three Lübeck pennies were worth four Rigan pennies. N-D & P, 63.
10. Earlier N-D & P, 63, suggested before 1320 as a date for abandoning minting on purely economic grounds; later, Pärn, "Das Münzwesen," concluded that political complications in the late thirteenth century were to blame.
11. For the record, it should be noted that some Estonians and Latvians (more correctly at this time, Letts, Livs, Kurs) lived in the towns. Some of their descendants, like Balthasar Russow, became so assimilated that outsiders assumed they were German. Also, Germans and Scandinavians lived in the countryside. They were most numerous in Estonia (including Wiek and Dorpat) and the archiepiscopal lands.
12. The Gotland system (see below in text) was same as the Italian system, in contrast to the English pound, in which the twelve ounces were each made into twenty pennies, thus giving 240 pence to the pound. The Cologne Mark was one-half of an English pound and was divided into 16 Lot (1/2 ounce), 64 Quentchen, and 256 Pfennig. A Luschin von Ebengreuth, Allgemeine Münzkunde und Geldgeschichte (Munich: Oldenbourg, 1969), 163, 200. The actual minting process involved mixing copper in the silver to harden it, so that a minted Mark produced many more pennies than the above calculation. As the first document concerning Livonian coins decreed in 1211 (Urkundenbuch, I, 27-28), one Silver Mark may be minted into four and one-half Marks of coins, "but the pennies must be white and good."
13.
13. Marija Gimbutas, The Balts (New York: Praeger, 1963), 166-67; valds Mugurvis, "The Culture of Inhabitants of Mediaeval Settlements in Latvia in Livonian Period (the End of the 12th--the [first] Half of the 16th Century)," Fasciculi Archaeologiae Historicae, 2 (1987), 68-69. This article (pp. 57-70) is a summary of "Wechselbesziehungen der Deutschen und Ostbaltischen Kulturen im Lettland des 13. bis 16. Jahrhunderts," and "Zur Archälogie mittelalterlicher Burgen in Lettland," Lübecker Schriften zur Archälogie und Kulturgeschichte, 12 (1986), 229-39, 241-59.
14. Emil Waschinksi, Brakteaten und Denare des Deutschen Ordens (Frankfurt, 1934), with some information about Livonian Bracteats. He also published articles in the Deutsches Münzblatt, 56 (1936), 81-87, 108-12, and 59 (1939), 228-42, 260-61, and a book, Die Münz- und Währungspolitik des Deutschen Ordens in Preussen, ihre historischen Probleme und seltenen Gepräge (Göttingen: der Göttinger Arbeitskreis, 1952). Pärn, in contrast, believes that the influence of the Prussian coinage did not begin before the mid-fourteenth century and was not really important until the end of the fifteenth-century. "Das Münzwesen."
15. This minting of Bracteats lasted until 1265, when they were replaced by a smaller hohlpfennig. N-D & P, 62.
16. The name is Low German for Ortung.
17. N-D & P, 62. The Silver Mark was debased to produce six and a half Marks in coins.)
18. These rare coins have been found only together with the bishop's Artigers. N-D & P note, 63-4, that the first minting was probably shortly after 1346, the year the Livonian Order purchased Estonia from Denmark (thus acquiring the Reval mint) and Bishop John V of Dorpat took office.
23. The meeting of the Assembly was announced January 13, 1420; by 13 June, the master was informing the mintmasters to suspend production. Urkundenbuch, V, part 1, 611-2, 645-6.
24. This was composed of the Livonian Order's officers, the Archbishop of Riga, the Bishops of Oesel-Wiek, Dorpat, Kurland, and Reval, representatives of the cities (most prominently, Riga and Reval), and representatives of the knightly corporations in Estonia. The August 27 meeting produced a detailed description of the regulations. Urkundenbuch, V, part 1, 867-70.
25. Pärn notes, "Das Münzwesen," that the actual relationship of the Schilling to the Penny was 9-1, not 12-1. Moreover, it was originally referred to as the neue Artig. The result of the confusing language and ambiguous worth caused debtors and lenders to ignore the entire reform and rely on traditional coins.
26. This was called a New Artiger, an interesting choice of words which indicates that in an era when monetary values were in flux, that contemporaries were as puzzled as we are about the proper choice of names for coins. The 1426 Assembly at Walk further authorized the minting of more Lübeck-weight pennies. N-D & P, 68-9.
27. The best descriptions of these coins is found in Walter Diebold, Die Münzen der Stadt Riga, 1201-1710, Part 1 (Livonian Order), Part 2 (Archbishops of Riga), and Part 3 (the Free City, Riga under Poland, and Riga under Sweden); Die Münzen der Stadt Reval 1230-1681; Die Münzen des Bistums Dorpat vom XIII bis zum XVI Jahrhundert; and Die Münzen der baltischen Städte Narwa, Wenden und des Bistums Oesel mit seinen Städten Arensburg and Hapsal. In comparison, D. Fedorov's Moneti Pribaltiki, xiii-xviii stoletii, opredelitel monet(Tallinn: Valgus, 1966) is less complete but has clear illustrations and is more easily acquired.
28. For the history of the medieval era in English, see Alfred Bilmanis A History of Latvia(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1951); Arnolds Spekke, History of Latvia (Stockholm: Goppers, 1951); William Urban, The Baltic Crusade (DeKalb: Northern Illinois University, 1976) and The Livonian Crusade (Washington: University Press of America, 1981); Eric Christiansen, The Northern Crusades (Minneapolis: the University of Minnesota, 1980).
30. Friedrich Vossberg's Geschichte der Preussischen Münzen und Siegel von der frühester Zeit bis zum Ende der Herrschaft des Deutschen Ordens (Berlin, 1843. Rpt. Leipzig: Zentralantiquariat der Deutschen Demokratische Republik, 1970) was written in a period of patriotic enthusiasm, to illustrate the glorious past of the Teutonic Knights (a more accurate translation would be the German Order). Although Vossberg's work does not deal with Livonia specifically, its monetary history of Prussia is essential for understanding the issuance of coins in Livonia.
The career of the Benedictine monk, Beda Franz Dudik, involved travel and numismatic research for the Teutonic Order. The thirty pages on Livonia in his major work, Des Hohen Deutschen Ritterordens Münzsammlung, 121-50, were the first effort to identify and organize the extant coins. However, he concentrated on the larger denominations found in collections, so that for smaller denominations, it is better to consult Michail Nemirowitsch-Dsntschenko and Franziskus Pärn, "Seestlinge und Scherfe. Ein Beitrag zur Münzgeschichte Livlands," Norddeutsches Jahrbuch für Münzkunde und verwandte Gebiete, 2 (1980), 61-96.
The best illustrations of the various coins are found in Hugo Freiherr von Saurma-Jeltsch, Die Saumaurische Münzsammelung deutscher, schweizerischer und polnischer Gepräge (Berlin, 1892. Rpt. Mörfelden-Walldorf: Gesellschaft für Internationale Geldgeschichte, 1980), 127-31. Lithuanian coins are 136-39, Riga 141-43, and the appropriate plates of illustrations lxxxix-lxxxx, lxxxv and following. Alternatively, see Heinrich Jochumsen, Verzeichnis aller bisher nachweisbaren baltischen Münzen und der Desiderata der Sammlung Anton Buchholz (ed. von Sengbusch. Riga, 1928), from Mitteilungen aus der livländischen Geschichte, 22 (1928), No. 4, 6-29.
31. N-D & P, 70-88; Pärn, "Das Münzwesen," traces the name Seestling to the fact that six were worth one Artig.
32. Culm law provided for the following: l Mark = 4 Vierdung = 24 Scot = 45 Halbschoter = 60 Schillings = 180 Vierchen = 720 Pennies.
33. Deboldt's articles on the coins of this era can be found in Münzen Revue, (1973), No. 3, 3-7, No. 4, 1-4, No. 5, 5-10; (1974), No. 4, 141-46, No. 5, 225-30; (1975), No. 4, 184-86, No. 5, 136-38, No. 6, 298-99, No. 7, 344-45; (1976), No. 7, 400-3, No. 8, 464-67, No. 9, 536, No. 10, 592-93, and No. 11, 664-65; also, Dmitri Fedorov, Monety Pribaltiki XIII-XVIII stoletij (Tallinn: Valgas, 1966) has a cyrillic text but excellent pictures.
35. Pärn, "Das Münzwesen," describes the political motivation behind this very rare and beautiful coin.
36. A Chronicle of Balthasar Russow (trans. Jerry C. Smith, William Urban, and Juergen Eichhoff. Madison: Baltic Studies Center, 1988), 70-72.