halve taler; twee eenheden, noodmunt uit Frankenthal, geslagen tijdens het beleg door Verdugo 1623

This silver coin, a ‘halve taler’, was struck anonymously in Frankenthal, during a siege by Verdugo. The square form immediately tells us that this wasn’t business as usual. Instead of the usual round blank, carefully shaped and stamped with refined imagery, this coin has been roughly cut from a sheet of silver and stamped with a simple design. Note the inscription, and central triangular motif. A rushed, expedient object like this speaks volumes about the conditions in which it was made: the pressure to produce currency during a crisis. Such “necessity money,” as it is sometimes called, is a vivid reminder that even something as seemingly neutral as money has a making story. The circumstances of this coin’s creation are right there on its surface. By looking closely at how things are made, we can learn a lot about the wider context of politics, labour, and consumption that the artwork inhabits.