240 Baker
were still being hoarded in the 1250s and 1260s. It is noteworthy that issues of
the Palaiologan emperors are missing from this body of finds and that in fact
only one post-1261 hyperpyron find from Greece has so far been recorded, from
an island off Euboea. Constantinopolitan hyperpyra might nevertheless have
continued to be used there, as they were in southern Italy. The reason why
hyperpyra were still hoarded in Greece in the second half of the century was
probably because they formed an integral part of the system of account based
around sterlings, grossi, and tournois. The preference for older issues may have
been due to their higher quality. Also the English and related pennies hoarded
after 1250 were largely of an earlier generation, since issues bearing the long
cross rev. design (minted after 1247) barely made any appearance in Greece.
By contrast, this was the period during which Venetian grosso imports were
gaining momentum, reaching all parts of the analysed territory, and playing a
particularly important role in Thessaly and Epirus.
In the 1250s and 1260s the importation of deniers tournois into Greece
reached its final phase. In these years tournois were being minted in large
quantities by the brothers of King Louis ix at mints in the south and south-
west of France. These were simultaneously pushed out of the kingdom by
royal legislation, and diverted to Italy and Greece through multiple channels,
amongst which possible administrative routes. It was in this context of increas-
ing imports of western silver coins that the principality of Achaea under
William ii de Villehardouin opened the new mint of Glarenza in the western
Peloponnese. It is uncertain whether petty denomination issue Metcalf type 12
was initially produced there on its own, or whether the mint issued this con-
currently with the first denier tournois variety, Tzamalis’ gv101.
The possible end of feudal and royal tournois minting in France in 1263/66
may have contributed to Glarenzan tournois issues which, on all accounts, were
started in the second half of the 1260s. This reliable silver-based coinage had a
profound impact on the monetary affairs of Greece. Most notably, it led to the
launch of tournois issues at four other Greek mints before the end of the cen-
tury, and it ensured that a host of pre-existing and subsequently imported sil-
ver coinages came to be culled from Greek circulation. The Glarenza mint went
through successive issues in the names of Princes Charles I, and possibly ii, of
Anjou (1278–89), Florent of Hainaut (1289–97), and Isabelle de Villehardouin
(1297–1301). Certainly by 1294 the output of the Glarenza mint was consistent
and high.38 After more than two decades of inactivity, the Thebes mint began
38 Anastasios P. Tzamalis, “Princess Isabelle of Achaia and her Husbands: A New Look
at an Old Numismatic Mystery,” Νομισματικά Χρονικά 23 (2004), 68–73, attempted to
re-arrange the chronology and organisation of minting in the names of Florent and