(sold for $51.0)

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1500, County of Gorizia, Leonhard. Scarce Silver "Vierer" Coin. Lienz mint!

Denomination: Kreuzer
Mint Period: 1462-1500
Reference: Rizzolli Li44. R!
Condition: Lightly bent, ohterwise VF.
Diameter: 18mm
Material: Silver
Weight: 0.89gm

Obverse: Shield with arms of Gorizia (rampart lion with stripes in background).
Legend: * LEONH COMES GORICI

Reverse: Cross with four rosettes in fields within inner circle.
Legend: * MON ETA NOVA LVEN

The County of Gorizia (German: Grafschaft Görz; Italian: Contea di Gorizia; Slovenian: Goriška grofija; Friulian: Contee di Gurize) was a county based around the town of Gorizia in the present-day Friuli-Venezia Giulia region of north-eastern Italy.

Count Meinhard, descendant of the Bavarian noble family Meinhardiner with possessions around Lienz in Tyrol, is mentioned as early as 1107. As a vogt of the Patriarchate of Aquileia he was enfeoffed with large estates in the former March of Friuli, including the town of Gorizia, and from 1127 on called himself a Graf von Görz. The borders of the county changed frequently in the following four centuries, due to frequent wars with the Aquileia and other counties, but also to the subdivision of the territory in two main nuclei: one around the upper Drava near Lienz, the other centered on Gorizia itself.

Meinhard's descendant Meinhard III, a follower of Emperor Frederick II of Hohenstaufen, was appointed administrator of Styria in 1248. He campaigned the Duchy of Carinthia but was defeated by Duke Bernhard von Spanheim in 1252. Nevertheless the county reached the apex of its power, when Meinhard III inherited the County of Tyrol (as Meinhard I) from his father-in-law Albert III one year later.

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Leonhard of Gorizia (1440 – 12 April 1500) was the last Count of Görz from the Meinhardiner dynasty, who ruled at Lienz and Gorizia (Görz) from 1454 until his death.

Leonhard was born at the comital residence Bruck Castle in Lienz, the son of Henry VI, Count of Gorizia and his wife, Katalin (Catherine), a daughter of the Hungarian palatine Nicholas II Garay. In 1454 he succeeded his father, who left him an almost ruined county with two separate territories.

Leonhard at first ruled jointly with his brothers John II and Louis. John as the eldest apparently held most of the power while younger Louis did not exercise any political role and died between 1456 and 1457. The brothers had to face the hostility of Emperor Frederick III who aimed to seize their remaining "outer county" around the town of Lienz and the Puster Valley, separating the Habsburg hereditary lands of Tyrol and Carinthia, which had been possessions of the Meinhardiner dynasty until the 14th century.

Moreover, John and Leonhard picked a fierce inheritance conflict around the lands of the extinct Counts of Celje after the death of Count Ulrich II in 1456, whereupon the defeated brothers not only had to renounce all their claims but also were forced to cede the residence at Lienz and various territories in Carinthia to Frederick III. The Counts of Görz had to move to Heinfels Castle. John died in 1462 and Leonhard became sole ruler. With the help of his capable deputy Virgil von Graben, a relative from the House of Graben von Stein, he recovered Lienz. Leonhard married, in 1478, Paola Gonzaga, the daughter of the Italian marquis Ludovico III of Mantua, but the union proved childless, as was his first marriage to Hieronyma of Ilok, the daughter of Nicholas of Ilok, King of Bosnia.

Facing the extinction of the dynasty, sickly Count Leonhard became subject to the competing pressures of both the Imperial Habsburg dynasty and the Republic of Venice, which both competed for his heritage. The Venice Ten, who since 1434 ruled over the Domini di Terraferma in Friuli, intended to seize the adjacent "inner county" centered around the town of Gorizia itself. In the end Leonhard leaned towards the Habsburgs and signed an inheritance treaty with Frederick's son Emperor Maximilian I.

Upon his death, Austrian troops immediately occupied the town of Gorizia. The Habsburgs (re-)united Lienz with the County of Tyrol and went on to rule as Counts in Gorizia (Gorizia and Gradisca from 1754). Leonhard's former deputy Virgil von Graben, who had played a vital role in the convergence to the Habsburg dynasty, took the position as a Stadtholder in Lienz from them.

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This coin has been sold for   $51.0

Notes: http://www.ebay.com/itm/371722944509 2016-09-05

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Posted by: anonymous
2016-08-30
 
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