Swiss Arms

Swiss Arms

Chapter 119

-VB-

Louis von Wittelsbach

Duke of Upper Bavaria

Munich

Louis could not believe his eyes or the gall of a mere baron to send a letter like this to him.

Even though he knew intellectually that the baron thought that he had a significant enough power to have the guts to send a letter commanding him (which was the title of the letter), Louis didn't care about that.

He wanted to march his army up to the mountain bure's village and strangle him in front of his new wife. A mere jumped-up baron making demands of a duke?! He would be wholly within his right to punish him, regardless of the fact that the baron was not under his rule.

So it frustrated him even more that he couldn't do that.

No, right now, he had a bigger problem at home. If the traitorous fucks wanted to run away from their ancestral home and cause trouble elsewhere, then good. He had less troublemakers at home to deal with.

And troublemakers had to be the cause of this.

He now knew for certain that the rich baron wasn't the cause of his troubles. His spies reported no large mint in production for certain, and it wasn't any of his peasant friends in their "Compact," either.

There was no one else rich enough to pull this stunt… leaving only one party left.

The Habsburgs.

It made for a certain amount of sense. His house and theirs were rivals. Both of them wanted to move into the Alps to control the trade. And only they had enough money and precious metals to cause damage to his duchy on this scale. Their mint had to be somewhere in the Duchy of Austria or their main holding in the city of Habsburg. And they were moving the coins through the Alps to throw him off.

And with their pet baron now making demands, they might use that as justification to intervene within his duchy.

So the best action to take … was to stop circulation of the counterfeit coins. Nôv(el)B\\jnn

How was he going to do that?

… Mint new coins.

Change the design. Change the gold and silver ratio. Change the weight of the coins.

It could work, but it would involve a lot of his own coins from the treasury. It would deplete them quickly, too. But right now, he didn't have a choice if he wanted to get the trust of the people and his own vassals.

'If I ever get my hands on whoever caused this…!' he vowed revenge mentally before calling up his loyal servants to aid him in his plans.

It took him over a week to just start the minting process and a full month before he was ready to distribute the new coins.

-VB-

The Counterfeit Crisis of 1305 that swept across Southern Bavaria is one of the first recorded financial crisis where modern historians have a near complete picture of from the start to end.

The sudden influx of counterfeit coins in the early spring of 1305 began a cascade of events that ultimately resulted in economic refugees, breakdown of trust between the then Duke Louis of Bavaria and his vassals, depletion of the ducal treasury, and the Bavarian-Tyrolian War of 1305. These coins, which we now know had large parts of their silvers with impurities like galena and tin, caused devaluation of the Munchen silver pfennigs. So much so that many documents written down at the time showing a near 150% increase in grocery prices in the span of a few months.

Neither the local industries and the duchy itself adapted to the rapidly changing inflation, and this resulted in many businesses and guilds possessing enough liquid assets on hand to purchase materials.

The local "Brundenstein-Nahr" pottery guild had many complaints sent to Duke Louis about the rapidly climbing price of clay during this period; 1 Munchen-pound of general-use clay was purchased on January 19th, 1305 for 3 copper pfennigs, but by April 5th, 1305, the price for 1 Munchen-pound of general-use clay had jumped to 1 silver pfennig and 9 copper pfennigs, a 630% increase in cost.

This caused many businesses and individuals to leave Munich, the center of the Duchy of Upper Bavaria and also the epicenter of the Counterfeit Crisis. It was in Munich that inflation struck the hardest and where it was the most uncontrollable.

The crisis had a ripple effect across the entire duchy. Many goods that were only made in Munich began to steeply soar in price across many towns and villages that traded with Munich. Towns as far as Free Imperial City of Kempten in modern day Allegau region (southwestmost region of modern state of Bavaria) saw prices on these goods rise …

-Excerpt from "Financial Crisis of Middle Ages" by Doctor Argus Feldkirch, University of Oxford

-VB-

Louis of Erstfeld

Part-Time Mercenary, Full-Time Farmer, Father of Baron Hans von Fluelaberg

Fluelaberg

He stared at his grandson.

He … stared at his grandson.

Oh, this wasn't his first grandson by a long stretch, but it was also another child in the family.

He hesitated before looking up at Isabella, his daughter-in-law. She may be the daughter-in-law, but he knew where the real authority lay here. From the way she looked at him, though, she made it look easy to forget that.

Louis looked back down at his grandson.

"Thank you for being with my son," he said with a smile. "He … his mother and I must have failed him a lot if he achieved all of this on his own but did nothing under our roof."

It was a growing insecurity that gnawed at him.

"Hans was happy to lazy around with his family," Isabella giggled. "He says that often. He definitely didn't have to worry about paperwork."

He chuckled along as he lightly bounced Louis Albert von Fluelaberg, the heir of the Barony of Fluelaberg. To think that one of his own blood would become a noble!

"... Little Louis is healthy," he hummed, not knowing what else to say.

"He is. Hans did everything to make sure Little Louis is healthy, though it can be overbearing at times," she sighed.

"Tell me about it?"

It was a nice small talk, and he was happy to hold his grandson for as long as he could.