THE EMERGENCY MONEY OF LEIDEN

In the October 28, 2018 E-Sylum a 5 Stuiver or ¼ Gulden paper emergency coin from the Dutch city of Leiden is shown. The manufacturing process is described as follows: “shredded prayer books and bibles were made into a macerated pulp and formed into pressed cardboard-like sheets. The sheets were than impressed with dies and either struck in collars or trimmed into perfectly round "coins."”

This is not correct, a description of this process, together with lots of other information, can be found in “Het Noodgeld van Leiden, waarheid en verdichting” (The emergency money of Leiden, fact and fiction) by Arent Pol and Bouke Jan van der Veen. (ISBN 978-90-12-12452-2). This booklet, based on a study of contemporary documents, is the printed version of a lecture given in 2007 in Leiden commemorating the siege and relief of Leiden in 1574.

In this booklet it is stated that the cardboard sheets were made by bookbinder Jan Adriaensz. by gluing together unused printed sheets. Two types were made, thick cardboard for the 1 Gulden (20 Stuiver) pieces and a thinner one for the ¼ Gulden. From these glued together pages planchets for coining were cut by stamping. From specimens that have fallen apart the separate sheets can clearly be seen. An example of such a paper 1 Gulden piece from a recent MPO auction is shown below
(https://mpoauctions.com/nl/bladeren?aid=32&cid=20089&lid=128548)

Interesting is that nearly all surviving specimens show a small counterstamp of a lion in an oval of dots. This counterstamp can also be seen on the Newman specimen, near the right leg of the lion. The counterstamp was applied to authenticate genuine pieces. This was needed as already within a few weeks after issue fake specimens appeared.

To read the earlier E-Sylum article, see:
NEWMAN SALE X CURRENCY HIGHLIGHTS : Lot 20014: 1574 Netherlands Siege of Leiden 5 Stuiver (http://www.coinbooks.org/v21/esylum_v21n43a16.html)

	NBS (coinbooks.org) Web