World of Coins

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From Wikipedia:

The Kingdom of Belgium covers an area of 30,688 square kilometres (11,849 sq mi) and has a population of more than 11.4 million. The capital and largest city is Brussels. Belgium's institutional organisation is structured on both regional and linguistic grounds. It is divided into three highly autonomous regions: Flanders in the north, Wallonia in the south, and the Brussels-Capital Region. Brussels is the smallest and most densely populated region, as well as the richest region in terms of GDP per capita.

Belgium is home to two main linguistic groups or Communities: the Dutch-speaking, mostly Flemish Community, which constitutes about 59 percent of the population, and the French-speaking Community, which comprises about 40 percent of all Belgians. A small German-speaking Community, numbering around one percent, exists in the East Cantons. The Brussels-Capital Region is officially bilingual (French and Dutch), although French is the dominant language. Belgium's linguistic diversity and related political conflicts are reflected in its political history and complex system of governance, made up of six different governments.

The second half of the 20th century was marked by rising tensions between the Dutch-speaking and the French-speaking citizens, fueled by differences in language and culture and the unequal economic development of Flanders and Wallonia. This continuing antagonism has led to several far-reaching reforms, resulting in a transition from a unitary to a federal arrangement during the period from 1970 to 1993. Despite the reforms, tensions between the groups have remained, if not increased; there is significant separatism particularly among the Flemish; controversial language laws exist, such as the municipalities with language facilities; and the formation of a coalition government took 18 months following the June 2010 federal election, a world record. Unemployment in Wallonia is more than double that of Flanders, which boomed after the war.

Belgium is one of the six founding countries of the European Union and hosts the official seats of the European Commission, the Council of the European Union, and the European Council, as well as a seat of the European Parliament in the country's capital, Brussels. Belgium is also a founding member of the Eurozone, NATO, OECD, and WTO, and a part of the trilateral Benelux Union and the Schengen Area. Brussels hosts several of the EU's official seats as well as the headquarters of many major international organizations such as NATO.

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The flag of Flanders, called the Vlaamse Leeuw ("Flemish Lion") or leeuwenvlag ("Lion flag"), is the flag of the Flemish Community and Flemish Region in Belgium. The flag was officially adopted by the Cultural Council for the Dutch Cultural Community in 1973, and later, in 1985, by its successor, the Flemish Parliament. In 1990, the coat of arms was also adopted as an official symbol.

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The flag of Wallonia represents the Walloon Region and French Community. Designed in 1913, the flag depicts a red rooster on a yellow field. The red and yellow colouring is historically associated with the city of Liège. The flag's association with Wallonia also mean that it is commonly used by the Walloon Movement.

On 3 July 1991, the French Community adopted by decree the Walloon Flag as its symbol, confirming an older decree from the former French Cultural Community of Belgium on 20 July 1975. On 15 July 1998, the Walloon Flag was officially recognised as the Flag of Wallonia by the Walloon Region.

During World War 2, Belgium was occupied by the Nazis. As a war-time measure, the regular coinage was replaced by a zinc coinage.

See: Belgium under Nazi Occupation (http://www.worldofcoins.eu/forum/index.php/topic,38440.0.html).

After the war, a new coin series, with new designs, was issued in stages, from 1948 to 1954.

 

Both the 1 and 5 franc coins were made of copper-nickel. They were respectively 21 mm and 24 mm in diameter.

The 20 and 50 francs coins were made of silver (.835).

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So far the designs have been rather Latin in influence, such as you would expect to find on the coins of France or Italy at that time. This reflects the greater political and economic influence of the French-speaking Walloons in those days. In later decades the Flemings would become more powerful within Belgium.

The silver coinage ceased production after 1955.

Please post any comments about the story so far. I will have a rest then continue later.

I am interested in why the Belgians switched from a 20 centimes to a 25 centimes coin.

The use of languages on the Belgian pre-euro coins is somewhat strange. :)  The country is officially trilingual (with German being a regional minority language), but French has always dominated the franc coins. Even the Dutch versions of the centime coins would say "centime(s)" only, not "centiem(en)", and German was not really used on coins anyway in those days. As for the switch from the 20c back to 25c, I am not sure ... Maybe because Luxembourg (BE and LU had a monetary union) also had a 25c coin?

Christian

Quote from: chrisild on April 09, 2019, 02:24:23 PM
As for the switch from the 20c back to 25c, I am not sure ... Maybe because Luxembourg (BE and LU had a monetary union) also had a 25c coin?

Yes, that's a possibility. Of course, the US also had a 'quarter', so maybe treacherous Belgium already had plans for world domination.  >:(  Scandalous. It's surely not too late to expel Belgium from the EU because of this. Why should my country should be the only one getting expelled?  :o

Quote from: <k> on April 09, 2019, 11:25:22 AM

I am interested in why the Belgians switched from a 20 centimes to a 25 centimes coin.

Inflation. 25 as the smallest value coin, fits into the logic with 50 as the next value. Combinations of 20 and 50 would be more difficult. I recall Denmark also had for a while 25 ore as the smallest value as well.

Quote from: Big_M on April 09, 2019, 03:23:54 PM
Inflation. 25 as the smallest value coin, fits into the logic with 50 as the next value. Combinations of 20 and 50 would be more difficult. I recall Denmark also had for a while 25 ore as the smallest value as well.

Did you read that somewhere? 20 and 25 denominations both have their advantages and disadvantages, so it seems to me like an unlikely reason.

Big-M is quite right. A 25 minor fits in with being the lowest denomination, as you could only have amounts ending with ½ major and ¼ major. However, if you have a 20 and a 50 minor, you should logically have a 10 minor also. Otherwise it is difficult to pay an amount ending with 10, 30, 60 or 80 minor. It would be possible, but it would require too many coins.

Politically, the change is potentially controversial, though. At the time, the Netherlands used a 1-2½-5 system, while France had a 1-2-5 system. Changing from 20 to 25 centiemen/centimes is therefore an implicit sop to the Flemish, as it broke the otherwise completely French coin denomination system. If I remember correctly, nobody noticed this at the time.

Peter

From 1986 to 1989, a new series of coins was introduced. I shall post them here, not in chronological order, but in order of denomination.

Time for another rest before I post about the final developments.

The topic is once more open for comments in the meantime.  :)

The 5F design I liked (and like). A stylized but still easily recognizable portrait of the king, an interesting font for the country name, and that somewhat subtle but obvious division into three thirds.

On the 1F coin those three thirds almost look like a Mercedes-Benz logo. ;) And the 50F piece is similar to the 5F but less ... hmm ... delicate. In the lower half, two thick lines go from the edge towards the center, and the upper half is almost empty.

Christian

Very badly designed coins, meaningless themes and no consistency whatsoever between the themes of the coins.There are no olive trees in Belgium, oak trees are not typically Belgian, unbelievable they used such caricature to refer to the constitution and if a God had existed surely it would have created something better than Belgium. The only thing I like designwise is the obverse of the 100 francs coin first issued in 1948.

There were no more new coin types for the Belgian franc after this, as the country awaited the transition to the euro.

There was a distinct change in design style from the mid-1980s onward.

Gone were the Latin gods and cereals.

In came spare and functional modern designs.


Stylised portraits were also now used.

They resembled those found on some Scandinavian coins.

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See:  Stylised portraits (http://www.worldofcoins.eu/forum/index.php/topic,41466.0.html).

Don't remember when I first saw one of the "miner" type coins, but it must have been after I had been "exposed" to coins from the nearby Netherlands. :)  Why? Because I had learned that the Dutch would have their queen on every piece - and I thought, aha, so that must be the Belgian king.

Later I learned that this was not even a depiction of some particular person but a sort of generic portrait of a miner. Pretty cool ...

Christian

Yes the miner coin is ok too although I do not know to what extent mining used to be typically Belgian and how important mines used to be in Belgium. While in school in Belgium, over the years I had to visit 2 different mines so it may have been somewhat significant.

All of this leaves a lot of questions of course. Why Ceres? Why Mercury? Why an olive branch? etc. Surely there must have been some sort of (bad) reasoning behind all that.

Mining was definitely a big industry in Belgium, especially in the greater Liège/Charleroi region. You may remember the Bois du Cazier disaster - to commemorate its 50th anniversary, Belgium issued a €10 collector coin (https://en.numista.com/catalogue/pieces26357.html) which also featured exactly that miner's head ...

Christian

Quote from: eurocoin on April 10, 2019, 08:38:09 PM
All of this leaves a lot of questions of course. Why Ceres? Why Mercury? Why an olive branch? etc. Surely there must have been some sort of (bad) reasoning behind all that.

As I mentioned, the Walloons were dominant in those days, so they were evidently influenced by the sort of themes found on certain French coins. Of course, France has a Mediterranean region, whilst Belgium does not, so the olive design does look out of place on a Belgian coin.

That branch on the 20F coin is a laurel twig, according to Schön anyway ...

Quote from: chrisild on April 10, 2019, 09:30:28 PM
That branch on the 20F coin is a laurel twig, according to Schön anyway ...

Laurel trees are native to the Mediterranean region - not Belgium.

During the postwar period (1945-1951) there was a real political struggle in Belgium, called the Royal Question (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_Question). Due to the way he acted during the war (visiting Hitler, marrying without the parlement's consent) Leopold III ad to stay in exile in Switzerland for a while. In the meantime his brother Charles of Flanders was regent of Belgium.
This was one of the reasons why "allegorical" themes were chosen for the first postwar coinage: to avoid putting the monarch's effigy or monogram on circulation coinage. A royal theme was only used on the silver 100 francs. This was a coin that, together with the silver 20 and 50 francs, saw almost no circulation. As there were notes of 20,50 and 100 francs available, the silver coins were hoarded.
Only in 1964, 13 years after his accession to the throne, was Baudouin's monogram used for the first time on a circulation coin (25 centimes). His effigy was used for the first time in 1969 on the 10 francs coin. Although Elstrom's design of king Baudouin was considered very beautiful, the reverse coat-of-arms design was considered a failure: as the design was very detailed, it proved impossible to get all of the details into the coin, as nickel proved too hard a material for this.

Thank you, bart - that explains a lot.

The allegorical themes were chosen to represent industry (miner), agriculture (Ceres) and trade (Mercurius)

Quote from: chrisild on April 10, 2019, 09:30:28 PM
That branch on the 20F coin is a laurel twig, according to Schön anyway ...

The leaves of olive and laurel are very similar. Symbolically, they are practically opposites, though: laurel stands for victory, olive for peace. In heraldry and usually on wreaths, olive is pictured with fruits, laurel without them. As this design has fruits and as poor Belgium has few victories to boast of, yet a great interest in peace, there is good case for the branch to be olive.

Peter

Then again, olive trees are probably rare in Belgium while laurel plants can be found in pretty much any region where the winters do not get too harsh. We have them here (Rhineland) too - and if you look at this bit (https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laurus_nobilis#Ornementale) ... "la Belgique est connue pour ses pépinières spécialisées dans la culture de laurier noble." Now if it is the symbolic meaning of the twig that counts here, then I agree, olive is more likely.

Edit - Wikipedia (https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pi%C3%A8ces_de_monnaie_en_franc_belge) suggests laurel too. Do a search for "laurier" on that page ...

Christian

Some interesting discussions here.  8)

Both the first and the last coin in the previous post were designed by the sculptor Harry Elstrøm by the way. Interestingly he was born in Berlin, Germany as a son of a Danish father and a British mother, then studied in Dresden. In the late 1920s he moved to Brussels ...

Christian

Belgium - trials.jpg

See:  Numisbids (https://www.numisbids.com/n.php?p=lot&sid=2519&lot=228).

See also: Patterns from Belgium (http://www.worldofcoins.eu/forum/index.php/topic,21894.0.html).

Quote from: chrisild on April 10, 2019, 09:30:28 PM
That branch on the 20F coin is a laurel twig, according to Schön anyway ...

According "De Belgische Frank", the encyclopedia about Belgian coins issued by the Belgian Royal Mint, the branch on the 20 franc is officially a olive branch.

Thank you. So Figleaf's post (Reply #76 (http://www.worldofcoins.eu/forum/index.php/topic,45431.msg284938.html#msg284938)) is correct.

Quote from: bart on April 11, 2019, 07:26:46 PM
According "De Belgische Frank", the encyclopedia about Belgian coins issued by the Belgian Royal Mint, the branch on the 20 franc is officially a olive branch.

Hmm, when it comes to Belgian coins, I tend to believe that those who design and make them know what they depict. ;) Thank you!

Christian

Quote from: bart on April 10, 2019, 09:40:18 PM
The allegorical themes were chosen to represent industry (miner), agriculture (Ceres) and trade (Mercurius)

That clears things up to some extent. There is also a god of industry though (Vulcan) so it is somewhat surprising they did not use that one too. In general I do not think it is a good idea to use gods on coins though.

Western Europe: Some pre-euro coinages issued after 1945.

01] Austria: pre-euro coinage from 1946 to 2001 (http://www.worldofcoins.eu/forum/index.php/topic,43846.0.html).

02] Belgian franc: from 1948 until the euro (http://www.worldofcoins.eu/forum/index.php/topic,45431.0.html).

03] Coinage of Switzerland (http://www.worldofcoins.eu/forum/index.php/topic,45897.0.html).

04] Cyprus: final coinage under British rule (http://www.worldofcoins.eu/forum/index.php/topic,49443.0.html).

05] Finland: Wildlife series of the 1990s (http://www.worldofcoins.eu/forum/index.php/topic,25942.0.html).

06] French coins from the 1950s until the introduction of the euro (http://www.worldofcoins.eu/forum/index.php/topic,47843.0.html).

07] German coinage of the Allied occupation, 1945 to 1948 (http://www.worldofcoins.eu/forum/index.php/topic,46863.0.html).

08] Greece 1973: the fascinating story behind Series A and B (http://www.worldofcoins.eu/forum/index.php/topic,14985.0.html).

09] Icelandic marine series, 1981 to date (http://www.worldofcoins.eu/forum/index.php/topic,14175.0.html).

10] Italy's final pre-euro coinage (http://www.worldofcoins.eu/forum/index.php/topic,43868.0.html).

11] Luxembourg's coinage after World War 2 but before the euro (http://www.worldofcoins.eu/forum/index.php/topic,47910.0.html).

12] Malta's pre-euro coinage, 1972-2007 (http://www.worldofcoins.eu/forum/index.php/topic,9100.0.html).

13] Milestones in the coinage of the Netherlands (http://www.worldofcoins.eu/forum/index.php/topic,35965.0.html).

14] Milestones in the decimal coinage of Gibraltar (http://www.worldofcoins.eu/forum/index.php/topic,12037.0.html).

15] Milestones in the decimal coinage of Guernsey (http://www.worldofcoins.eu/forum/index.php/topic,11469.0.html).

16] Milestones in the decimal coinage of Ireland (http://www.worldofcoins.eu/forum/index.php/topic,43366.0.html).

17] Milestones in the decimal coinage of Jersey (http://www.worldofcoins.eu/forum/index.php/topic,11503.0.html).

18] Milestones in the decimal coinage of the Isle of Man (http://www.worldofcoins.eu/forum/index.php/topic,11994.0.html).

19] Milestones in the decimal coinage of the UK (http://www.worldofcoins.eu/forum/index.php/topic,12072.0.html).

20] Norwegian wildlife series, 1958 to 1973 (http://www.worldofcoins.eu/forum/index.php/topic,14248.0.html).

21] Portugal's final pre-euro coin series (http://www.worldofcoins.eu/forum/index.php/topic,44163.0.html).

22] Pre-euro Coinage of the Federal Republic of Germany (http://www.worldofcoins.eu/forum/index.php/topic,45480.0.html).

23] Pre-euro coinage of the Republic of Greece, 1976 to 2001 (http://www.worldofcoins.eu/forum/index.php/topic,49456.0.html).

24] Republic of Cyprus: pre-euro coinage (http://www.worldofcoins.eu/forum/index.php/topic,49444.0.html).

25] Spain: pre-euro coinage of King Juan Carlos I (http://www.worldofcoins.eu/forum/index.php/topic,49513.0.html).