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Lille, Siege coinage 1708

Started by andyg, February 27, 2010, 03:08:34 PM

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andyg

Below is a scan of a 20 Sols issued by the French during a three month siege of Lille by the English and the Austrians in 1708.

The coin reads XX.S (20 Sols)
"Pro defensione vrbis et patria"
But I'm at a loss to work out what the "vrbis" translates as ???

Figleaf

#1
City.

Excellent piece of history of a bloody siege

Peter
An unidentified coin is a piece of metal. An identified coin is a piece of history.

translateltd

Slight refinement: urbs is city, urbis is "of the city".  Last word is "patriae" rather than patria, i.e. "of the country/fatherland".




andyg

#3
Thanks both,

never thought to spell it with a 'U', bit obviovs really.


Figleaf

Who cares, this is a prize piece. The big lesson of the war of the Spanish succession, both here and ultimately in the bloody battlefields of Blenheim ("It was a famous victory") and Malplaquet, is that storming a well-entrenched enemy position is bloody, exhausting and useless. The pinnacle of that lesson was the first world war, when both parties were entrenched and it took tanks to make infantry dynamic again, but it started in Lille, flared up in Stalingrad and I hope it ended only when Iran sent huge waves of ill-equipped and untrained attackers against the dug in Iraqi army. Do you think the Chinese have learned the lesson?

I am wondering about the side with the crown. At first sight it looks like crowned arms on two crossed cannons, but what are all the little letter-like thingies doing there? [speculation] The defenders withdrew to the citadel early on and the citadel is described as a "double ring" (surprising by itself, since I would have expected a star-shaped citadel). What if the ring is the citadel with the French lilies inside and the enemy outside? [/speculation]

Peter
An unidentified coin is a piece of metal. An identified coin is a piece of history.

andyg

It's a shield on crossed pikes, with the order chain in the background.  I suspect they are not letters, though they do look like them.

Figleaf

#6
Got it. It's indeed the chain of some order, dangling on it below. But them is not pikes!

Peter
An unidentified coin is a piece of metal. An identified coin is a piece of history.

Figleaf

#7
Another case of 12 years later, better software, better screen and a little wiser ;)

I see now a semée of heraldic lillies (Bourbon, France) inside the circle and a mix of fire irons (Burgundy) and something else in the chain around it. In view of the Burgundian symbols, the order may be that of the golden fleece, though the outline of the order doesn't seem to fit. Not sure about the cross the arms are on. They may be marshall's batons or cannons.

Peter
An unidentified coin is a piece of metal. An identified coin is a piece of history.

Manzikert

There are three rows of chain, the middle one is the Fleece and I think the outer one is the Holy Spirit, but I don't know what the inner one is (I can see the pendant badges on the middle and outer ones, but nothing on the inner one).

Alan

SpaBreda

This is what CGB.fr says about it :

AVERS
Titulature avers : ANÉPIGRAPHE.
Description avers : Armes du maréchal de Boufflers couronnées brochant sur deux bâtons de Maréchal entourés des colliers des Ordres de Saint-Louis, du Saint-Esprit et de Saint-Michel.
REVERS
Titulature revers : XX S / .PRO / DEFENSIONE / .VRBIS. ET / .PATRIÆ. / 1708.
Description revers : en six lignes dans le champ.
Traduction revers : (20 sols, pour la défense de la ville et de la Patrie).