Recently I came across a small coin up for auction that caught my eye and the more I examined it the more I wanted to add it to my collection. Like many coins I fixate on acquiring, I am fairly confident that I paid top dollar plus another 20+ percent for my enthusiasm. My lack of restraint and negotiating abilities aside and not content to simply own the piece, I decided to take a closer look at it and the history surrounding the coin.

It is a 1731, 2-Kreuzer (occasionally referred to as a ½ landbatzen) of Leopold Anton and it was minted in Salzburg, Austria. Coinage in Salzburg had begun around the year 1000 with the minting of pfennigs. Those first pfennigs were the models for the later Viennese pfennig which was superceded later still by the Friesach pfennig. The Graz pfennig was influenced by those earlier pfennigs but was not as widely used. Kreuzers evolved from the Veronese (or Bern) pfennig and were made of Silver until 1760 and then of Copper until 1892 when they were replaced by Heller denominated coins. The most commonly used coin was a three Kreuzer coin or Groschen. The kreuzer actually developed in Tyrol (another modern federal state of Austria) but eventually spread throughout Austria. A kreuzer coin can most simply be defined as any of several small coins of low value formerly used in Austria and Germany. The word "kreuzer" probably came from the Middle High German word kriuzer, or kriuze, previously from the Old High German krzi, and even previous to that from the Latin crux or cruc, meaning cross. The coin came to be called a kreuzer because the original design displayed a prominent cross.

History class, when I was much younger, seemed to be the low point of my school day. It was oh so difficult to remain awake as the teacher droned on and on and on about some long dead and forgotten person or some consequence of an ancient incident that helped (very tenuously in my teen opinion) to shape the world we live in today. It didn't help that my history class was always the first class after lunch. Maybe I was attempting to digest some fine cafeteria cuisine and had little blood left over to support any serious brain activity. I suspect that is it, surely my non-interest was no fault of my own!

Things have sure changed since way back then, or maybe it is only I that have changed. History is much more interesting to me now but that could be because I have seen so much more of it! I think that if my teacher could have brought actual artifacts from the time periods we were studying and maybe gotten us out of our seats to act out scenarios (and keep us awake), maybe history could have seemed more real, more immediate and more exciting. I know I am prejudiced, but our teacher would have benefited from attending one of the ANA's "Coins in the Classroom" seminars if they had existed then. A few coins used as learning tools in classroom would have brightened my day at least!

In researching this little coin, I discovered that 1731 was not nearly as boring and unimportant a year as I might have supposed as a teen. Salzburg got its name from the nearby salt mines, near which, humans lived as early Neolithic time. However Salzburg's founding, (the city and consequently the state) is generally considered to begin with St. Rupert; a Benedictine Monk who started a monastery there in 696. Salzburg eventually evolved into a church state ruled by an archbishop. The Salzburg of 1731 was an "ecclesiastical principality" or "Archbishopric" of the Holy Roman Empire and still administered by a prince-archbishop. It consisted of roughly the same area as does the present-day federal state of Salzburg.

Despite the tendency of many of the princes to ignore the desires and needs of their subjects as much as possible, they exercised a tremendous amount of power and could be quite ruthless, indifferent and arbitrary. Leopold Anthony Eleutherius Freiherr von Firmian (1679-1744), Archbishop of Salzburg 1727-1744 was able to settle centuries of religious strife and bring a period of relative peace to the area. This admirable accomplishment was brought to fruition by enacting an emigration decree which led to the expulsion of 23,000 Protestants from Salzburg. The Prince was shocked and maybe even a little dismayed to learn that so many of his people were Protestant but never the less he wouldn't retract his decree. I am fairly confident that the Protestants failed to appreciate the archbishop's successful peace initiative.

Leopold Anton had Schloss Loepoldskron (Leopold's Castle) built in 1736 as a family estate and the property was later owned by one of the founders of the Salzburg Festival (Music festival of International renown). From 1918 to 1956, the castle/palace served as a cultural meeting place for prominent festival guests.

Elsewhere in the World in 1731, France had an enlightened idea and passed laws that forbade barbers from practicing surgery, although the practice continued elsewhere in Europe. Barbers performing surgery seems to make semi-logical sense if you just look at the idea with the right frame of mind. If the surgery were to be a failure, at least you could be a well groomed corpse. The French also built Fort Vincennes, later named Fort Sackville near present-day Vincennes, Indiana (USA). In 1779 the fort was captured by Colonel George Rogers Clark elder brother to William Clark of Lewis and Clark fame.

Erasmus Darwin, the Grandfather of Charles Darwin, was born in 1731. He established a medical practice in Lichfield. I wonder if he did barbering too. At one point during his career he refused the post of royal physician to George III. Erasmus had a broad range of scientific interests including Astronomy. He was a prolific inventor and made many useful devices including a canal lift for barges, a copying machine, and a variety of weather monitoring machines. He didn't believe that a scientist should own patents and never patented any of his inventions. He was also a successful poet and between 1794 and 1796 he published a scientific book, "Zoonomia". In it he proposed a theory of life starting from a common origin and through diversification becoming all the myriad life on the planet. This theory would gain widespread recognition as the brainchild of his famous grandson Charles, who did develop it much more fully.

During 1731 Robert Jenkins, an English privateer and captain of the good ship Rebecca while on his way home to London from Jamaica passed near Havana and was boarded by Spanish customs officials. According to the 1729 Treaty of Seville, the Spanish were allowed to search British merchant ships while in Spanish waters to verify that no trade had been conducted with Spanish colonies. Jenkins, testifying before the British House of Commons a few years later, told tales of his torture and mistreatment by the Spanish. He displayed for the gentlemen of the House a pickled ear in a wooden box and told of how the Spanish severed his ear and told him to deliver it to King George as token of what they intended for the King. While not entirely believed, and considered by many to be a scoundrel, Jenkins's story outraged the populace and along with many other real or perceived insults by the Spanish led in 1739 to "The War of Jenkins's Ear". This little war and the importance of Jenkins's ear would quickly be eclipsed by global conflict, the "War of Austrian Succession".

The Swedish East India Company was formed in 1731. It certainly wasn't the first East India Company to be formed, as many nations wanted a piece of the East Indies. During the 17th Century the Portuguese held a virtual monopoly on trade with China but the Dutch and English began to travel to the East Indies. Sweden wanted to in the 17th century but wars and disturbances seemed to distract her and funnel most of the available cash away from such projects. Austria and Denmark also joined the mix in the early 18th century but Austria's (The Ostend East-India Company) charter was cancelled in 1731.

Henry Cavendish the English physicist who would later discovered Hydrogen was born in 1731. Among his many accomplishments, he calculated the average density of the earth, established an accurate composition of the atmosphere, and determined the composition of water. Abnormally shy with the ladies, rich, eccentric, meticulous, and very intelligent, Cavendish was well respected by his peers as a proper gentleman and accomplished scientist.

Martha Dandridge, later the widow of Daniel Park Custis, was born in 1731. In 1759 she married George Washington which would eventually make her the first First Lady of the United States. Both Robert Treat Paine and William Williams were born and they would both later become signers of the US Declaration of Independence.

New York acquired their first fire trucks and they were made of wood. The fire engines were pulled by hand and the pump was also human powered. The fire trucks had to be loaded with water by hand as well because they didn't have a suction pump for that purpose. I wonder if any of those wooden fire trucks had caught fire what the firemen would have used to put it out.

In 1731 Benjamin Franklin was a busy man about town. He founded the first circulating library in America, turned 25 and joined the Freemasons. He began staying at a boarding house owned by Sarah Read (his future mother-in-law). She charged him £10 per year. He printed thirteen known publications and advertised a fourteenth, but the ad (1 April) for the fourteenth may have been an April fool's joke.

Benjamin Banneker was born in Maryland and grew up a free black man. He was self taught and an avid stargazer. He is believed to have made one of the first clocks in America and he carved the gears for it with a knife. President George Washington appointed him to the District of Columbia Commission in 1789 to help survey the new capital city of Washington, D.C.

In 1731, the area that would one day be Texas, belonged to Spain. There were three Spanish Missions relocated to along the San Antonio River; San Juan Capistrano, Nuestra Senora Purísima Concepción de Acuña, and San Francisco de la Espada. Construction of the Alamo had begun earlier and was first named the Mission San Antonio de Valero. Originally the Alamo had been founded a short distance to the North in 1717 but was relocated in 1731 and completed in 1744. There were at least 29 Missions and numerous Presidios built by the Spanish in the area that is present day Texas.

The 1731 Leopold Anton 2-kreuzer coin is a nice little piece of history. It is listed in the Standard Catalogue of World Coins as a one year type, KM#335, but KM#290 minted during many of the years from 1708-1723 is similar. It is made of Silver (probably of no greater purity than .500) and is quite small at approximately 18mm in diameter. The obverse design consists of a legate hat above a cross and two Wappen (coats of arms) and the denomination below. The design to the left is the coat of arms of Salzburg of that time and the one on the right is the coat of arms of Leopold Anton. In EF condition, at most auctions the coin will sell for around 40 dollars US.

There were many interesting events occurring and fascinating people being born, living and dying in 1731. Some few may actually have had an opportunity to spend this coin. I wonder what it bought. The people and events from that time really did help shape the world we live in today. If you think about them for a short while, then you may notice that the connections to today are not very tenuous after all.

Thanks to Mr. James Higby for help with some of the coin specifications, however any errors are entirely my own.