later terminology) long remained the standard for “strong” money. Weakening the
coinage, which had the effect of increasing the money supply, was inflationary and
recognized as such, but there were reasons why it might take place.
Mints were expected to be self-supporting, so coins actually issued were given an
official value (prix) that exceeded the cost of the bullion. The difference, known as the
monnayage, was made up of two parts—the relatively consistent brassage, which
represented the cost of minting, and a second component, seigneuriage, which was the
profit of the lord operating the mint. To issue “strong money,” the royal mints had to buy
silver for less than three l.t. per mark. If bullion were scarce and it cost more to attract it
to the mints, the mints would lose money unless the pied were raised. One purpose of the
old regional money taxes was to keep the mints solvent without weakening the coinage.
Most lords with mints, however, were not content merely to break even. As long as the
seigneuriage remained modest and stable (another objective of the money taxes), few
questioned the seigneurial right to profit from the mints, but the 14th-century monarchy
had heavy military expenses and tried to use mint profits as a fiscal expedient, raising the
pied to increase seigneuriage. After considerable outcry, Philip VI returned the pied to
the level of St. Louis in 1330–33, but then the mints ran afoul of a bullion shortage and
actually had to close from 1335 to 1337.
With the outbreak of the Hundred Years’ War, Philip had to reopen his mints and
needed the revenue from seigneuriage. By 1343, he had weakened the currency to the
sixtieth pied. The demand for reform again led the king to strengthen the money, but
when he suddenly adopted the fifteenth pied, the effect was profoundly deflationary and
he soon had to weaken the currency again.
Under John II the Good, the currency was a major political issue. Innumerable
changes geared to the level of commercial activity created such confusion that people
now demanded “sound” (i.e., stable) money more than “strong” money. The leading
theoretician of the period, Nicole Oresme, denounced the whole idea that currency was a
private seigneurial right and insisted that it belonged to the whole community. The
monetary chaos reached its height in the later 1350s. Then, in 1360, the requirements of
the king’s ransom led to the establishment of substantial regular taxes and a reform of the
currency that placed the silver coinage on the twenty-fourth pied and established a new
gold coin, the franc, that would equal one livre tournois in money of account. Regular
taxation kept the kings from seeking high mint profits, and the reform of 1360 remained
in force, with small modifications, for over fifty years. The civil wars and financial chaos
of the early 15th century produced another generation of monetary confusion like that of
1337–60. Not until the later 1430s was the currency stabilized again.
Manufacture of coins at the mints was entrusted to specialists called moneyers who
enjoyed a number of important, mostly fiscal, privileges. A few randomly selected coins
from each issue, sent to Paris in a sealed box, were inspected to ensure accuracy and
honesty at the mints. One or more specialists in the Chambre des Comptes exerted
centralized control over the currency, and toward the late 1340s a subcommittee of the
Chambre obtained official status as the Chambre des Monnaies, which maintained regular
records after 1356.
John Bell Henneman, Jr.
[See also: MINTS]
Bisson, Thomas N. Conservation of Coinage: Monetary Exploitation and Its Restraint in France,
Catalonia, and Aragon (c. A.D. 1000–c. 1225). Oxford: Clarendon, 1979.
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