PURGE OF THE MONEYERS

The reputation of English King Henry I is negatively marked by his Purge of the Moneyers in 1124-25. The most vivid contemporary account is contained in the Anglo Saxon Chronicles for those years. The background of continental war and agricultural dearth suggests other reasons were responsible for the loss of confidence in the currency. Scapegoating those who minted silver into pennies might have satisfied a political need but it did not really solve the fundamental problems of high taxation and poor harvests.

ANGLO - SAXON  CHRONICLE

AD 1124     

         All this year was the king in Normandy. That was for the great hostility that he had with the King Louis of France, and with the Earl of Anjou...

        This same year were the seasons very unfavourable in England for corn and all fruits; so that between Christmas and Candlemas men sold the acre-seed of wheat, that bis two seedlips, for six shillings; and the barley, that is three seedlips, for six shillings also; and the acre-seed of oats, that is four seedlips, four four shillings. That is because that corn was scarce; and the penny was so adulterated, that a man who had a pound at market could not exchange twelve pence thereof for anything...

         This same year, after St Andrew's mass, and before Christmas, held Ralph Basset and the king's thanes a wittenmoot in Leicestershire, at Hunothoe, and their hanged more thieves than ever were known before; that is, in a little while, four and forty men altogether; and despoiled six men of their eyes and testicles. Many true men said that there were several who suffered very unjustly; but our Lord God Almighty, who seeth and knoweth every secret, seeth also that the wretched people are oppressed with all unrighteousness. First they are bereaved of their property, and then they are slain. Full heavy year was this. The man that had any property, was bereaved of their property by violent guilds and violent moots. The man that had not, was starved with hunger.

AD 1125

           In this year sent the King Henry, before Christmas, from Normandy to England, and bade that all the mint-men that were in  England should be mutilated in their limbs; that was, that they should lose each of them the right hand, and their testicles beneath. This was because the man that had a pound could not lay out a penny at a market. And the Bishop Roger of Salisbury sent over all England, and bade them all that they should come to Winchester at Christmas. When they came thither, then were they taken one by one, and deprived each of the right hand and the testicles beneath. All this was done within the twelfth-night. And that was all in perfect justice, because that they had undone all the great quantity of base coin that they all bought...

       In this same year was so great a flood on St Laurence's day, that many towns and men were overwhelmed, and bridges broke down, and corn and meadows spoiled withal; and hunger and qualm (anxiety) in men and cattle; and in all fruits such unseasonableness as was not known for many years before."

EADMER  of  CANTERBURY

Other chroniclers repeated the common suspicion that the moneyers were at fault. Eadmer's Historia novorum commended the king for re-establishing the practice of mutilating minters of false coins. The dishonest practice of producing debased pennies was believed to have been "harming many people in many ways". The imposition of harsh penalties "alleviates the kingdom's suffering". From the announcement alone "great good immediately resulted".

"Rising problems during the early years of the twelfth century, whether caused by money supply or the general economic conditions, led to increased concern over the state of the coinage". Eadmer "mentions an edict, issued by Henry I around the same time as another edict known to have been issued at Whitsun 1108, requiring that "no penny or halfpenny should be whole", so that coins were snicked in the edge before they were issued in order to show they were of good silver and not plated". [D Brown, 2014].

Another regulatory approach to assure the integrity of the money supply was re-smelting. 

"The Normans, like the Anglo-Saxons, recoined the circulating silver currency every few years, introducing a new design (type) at each recoinage, a system known as 'renovatio monetae'. Some hundred leading citizens drawn from the major towns across England manufactured coins in the workshops under their control. In the outlying centres this was to produce coin for the payment of taxes, but the major mercantile centres had several moneyers (minters) and produced significant quantities of coin to support trade. Each moneyer was provided with at least one pair of dies (moulds); the obverse bearing the name and portrait of the king as the issuing authority, and the reverse bearing the name of the moneyer and the town in which he worked." [D Brown, 2014].

The LINCOLN HOARD

      "The finding of large numbers of coins of the London moneyer Sigar and the Northampton moneyer Stiefne in the Lincoln hoard has provided the means to discover whether all of the type 14 (the last coin issue before the 1124-25 purge) moneyers faithfully applied one national weight standard...(by comparing) the weights of 23 undamaged coins by Sigar and 58 of Stiefne with the remaining 515 undamaged type 14 pennies in the corpus (hoard).

       The coins of Sigar are quite clearly of an abnormally low weight with a mean of only 1.02 g. and a quartile range of 0.99 g. to 1.05 g. This seems to provide clear evidence of malpractice by a moneyer who may well have punished in the assize of moneyers.

       The coins of Stiefne are also of lower weight than the aggregate of the rest of the corpus, although they are much closer to it, with a mean of 1.29 g. and a quartile range from 1.26 g. to 1.32 g. This might constitute further evidence of the use of a relatively low weight standard by a type 14 moneyer.

       The mean for the remaining 515 coins is 1.31 g. and the quartile range is from 1.26 g. to 1.38 g., but the modal value is much higher than the mean at 1.37 g. with 48 coins. The mean has been pulled down by the long tail of coins lighter than the mode, which may well include further examples of issues at weights deliberately reduced by the moneyer."

[M Allen, 2009] 

This example shows there may be some merit to the prejudice against the moneyers. However, there is also evidence that conformity to one standard weight was not always achieved across the kingdom. That, at least, is the impression gained from comparing a selection of lead weights that were used to check the coinage at the time.

     "If, as has been claimed, pence at twenty to the new Roman ounce of 27 g. (1.35 g. each on average, as per 'de xx in ora'), were the norm from about 1053 onwards...silver pennies so specified would be accepted by number...The standard of weights 'as in London and Winchester'...found regularly...are round, made of lead...produced by casting in a mould...seem to resemble coin-types..."

Example 1 "has a 'cross and pellets' design...In the early Norman period it occurs on (the reverse side of) coins of the Paxs type...Its diameter is 43 mm, thickness 6 mm, and mass 78 g. It may have been used for checking a payment of five shillings (60d.), in which case the pennies must have weighed at least 1.30 g."

Example 2 "resembles the reverse of type 14 pennies of Henry I, issued 1123-25, and often known as the 'Pellets in Quatrefoil' type...diameter 42 mm, thickness 5mm, mass 73 g. If it was intended for checking five shillings-worth of pennies, the pennies must have weighed at least 1.22 g."

Example 3 "is similar to 2 but with a more generic design and a border of Vs rather than inscription...same diameter...slightly thicker...mass is 96 g. If 3 is a five-shilling weight (60d.) the pennies must have weighed about 1.60 g., but if it is a half-mark weight (80d.), the pennies must have weighed about 1.20 g."

Example 4 "diameter 37 mm, thickness 7 mm, mass 65 g. One element of the design appears to be a representation of the paschal lamb...the seal of the Knights Templar, who were active in England from about 1120 onwards...It could have been used to check pennies of the 1.35 g. standard, in which case it would represent four shillings (48d.). But it may well date from a later period, when the pennies were heavier."

[N Briggs, 2007].

       "William the Conqueror and his followers were very familiar with the so-called 'denarial economy', in which all payments, however large, had to be made in silver pennies...It is also very likely that the Normans were accustomed to a system of weights and measures that varied from place to place...There is plenty of documentary evidence that large payments in pennies were routine in the twelfth century...

       It seems unlikely that we shall ever see the metrological picture of the reign of Henry I in full detail...Numismatists have long been intrigued by the events of 1124/5, when the moneyers were summoned to Winchester and mutilated for their misdeeds...Whatever actually happened, it must be concluded that standardization was not an accomplished fact by that time."

[N Briggs, 2007].

The GREAT ROLL of the PIPE for the 31st YEAR of the REIGN  of KING HENRY I

       "The principal source of documentary evidence for the moneyers of type 14 (pre-purge silver pennies) is the sole surviving exchequer (treasury) pipe roll of the reign of Henry I, which covers the accounting year from Michaelmas (29 September) 1129 to Michaelmas 1130...The entry that most unambiguously refers to the assize of moneyers is the payment of £4 by the Chichester moneyer Brand toward a debt of £20, so that he should not be mutilated with the other moneyers."

[M Allen, 2009].

      "The four persons described as moneyers in the roll were Brand (Honour of Arundel), Gillopatric (Pembroke), Saiet (Hampshire), and Ulchetell (Norfolk). In the cases of four others the entries relate to minting offences ― Algar, Spracheling, and Godwin Quachehand, all at London, and Saiet's nephew Alvric under Hampshire...

       Brand's entry provides what appears to be the only direct reference to the Winchester assize...He had paid £4 into the exchequer in 1129/30 and still owed £16. If he had been paying off his debt at the same annual rate since 1124/25, his original fine would have been £40...One wonders whether Brand can have been alone in being allowed to pay a fine instead of being mutilated with the other moneyers. Given the attractions of revenue to the crown, it could have been an option offered to quite a number of moneyers adjudged guilty...

       The moneyer Gillopatric...paid 40 shillings in 1129/30 and still owed 40. If paid at (the equivalent of) £2 per annum since 1124/25, his original fine would have been £14...as befits the output of a very small county mint where he was the only moneyer. The nature of his wrongdoing in relation to the old coinage is not stated...

       Algar and Spracheling, though not described as moneyers, are entered under London as owing 10 marks for an offence of false pennies ('pro foris falsorum denariorum') which sounds like something close to forgery...there are some plated forgeries...that appear to carry his (Algar's) name...

       Also expressed in marks, but of gold worth ten or twelve times as much as silver, was the debt of Godwin Quachehand, who owed 4 marks...in order that he might have pardon for a placitum (sic) of the coinage (monete)...

       Saiet's debt was of a different order. He owed the huge sum of 278 marks (£185 6s. 8d.) for the fee or payment (placitum) of two dies...Seaby 1988 has drawn attention to the fact that only three of the Winchester moneyers of type 14, Alfric/Alvric (Saiet's nephew), Godwin/Godwine, and Saiet, continued into type 15, and he sees this as corroborating the statement in the Winton Annals that all the moneyers except three of Winchester were mutilated...Saiet's (huge) debt is not stated to have been the penalty for an offence...As a punishment it would have been of exceptional severity...If, on the other hand, it rep[resents some form of account, it could perhaps relate to silver provided by the crown for minting, since the Treasury was still held at Winchester at this date."

[I Stewart, 1991].

MINTS and MONEYERS

      "We may suppose that at any given time, between one and two hundred moneyers were active in some fifty or sixty cities and towns...

       The principal dating events relevant to this coinage are the accession of William the Conqueror (1066), the accession of Henry I (1100), the purge of the moneyers (1124-25), the accession of Stephen (1135)...

       There are twenty-seven types between 1066 and the purge of the moneyers in 1124; thirteen of these bear the name of William (1066-1100) and fourteen the name of Henry (1100-1135)..."

[D Brown, 2014]

      "The figures for the reign of Henry I (1100-1135)...a nadir of only 20-31 (31-40) moneyers at 15-19 (18-21) mints in...c. 1106-13. This would seem to provide evidence of the effects of the general shortage of silver from European mines in the years around 1100...

       The numbers recover sharply to 113 (114) moneyers at 46 (47) mints in...c. 1117-19, before falling to 45 (48) at 30 (37) mints in...c. 1119-21, and rising again to 146-43 (138-45) at 53-4 mints in...c. 1123-1124/5...The sharp peaks in the figures...might possibly have been connected with the heavy taxation during Henry I's war[s] in Normandy...

       The fall in figures after c.1123-24/5 to only 110-11 [sic] moneyers at 22 mints in c. 1125-35 provides clear evidence of Henry I's assize of moneyers in 1124-25 and the subsequent closure of mints. In the early years of the reign of Stephen (1134-54) many of the mints closed under Henry I were reopened...peak of 158-60 moneyers at 44 mints..."

[M Allen, 2012]

The interpretations put forward by various numismatic authorities in recent decades are not very convincing. Their own detailed research over past decades has produced a confusing medieval mosaic with generally inaccurate weights and measures prevailing across the kingdom. Comparing the quality of coin, by individual silver penny weight versus collective lead counterweights, or the corruption of moneyers, in contemporary documents and accumulated coin signatures, has not demonstrated anything conclusively other than the general inability to conform to a single standard.

To suggest that the guilt of the moneyers was the cause of loss of confidence in the money supply is to ask the wrong question in the first place. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle clearly describes a situation of price-inflation, the consequence of a fixed amount of money chasing too few goods. The same quantity of coin no longer buys the same weight of corn, and this is the only obvious knowledge that confronts buyers in the market-place.

The regime's response is to punish a class of scapegoats, and the 'normal suspects' will do very nicely. Their aim is to deflect public anger, to avoid social unrest and rebellion, by looking as though they are dealing with the problem. 

What everyone is really doing is ignoring an appallingly inefficient feudal economy producing paper-thin surpluses in good times and famine during the rest. More to the point,

they are averting blame from a rapacious elite of military goons who are more interested in carving up the economic cake than increasing its size.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, online English translation, AD 1124 &  AD 1125, <avalon.law.yale.edu/subject.menus/angsax.asp>

David Brown, 2014, 'The Number of Moneyers and the Frequency of Recoinages in the Norman Period', British Numismatics Journal, vol 84

Martin Allen, 2012, 'The Mints and Moneyers of England and Wales, 1066-1158', British Numismatics Journal, vol 82, pp 54-120

Martin Allen, 2009, 'Henry I Type 14', British Numismatics Journal, vol 79

C Warren Hollister, 1978, 'Royal Acts of Mutilation: The Case Against Henry I', Albion: A Quarterly Journal Concerned With British Studies, vol 10, no 4, pp 330-340

Sir Ian Stewart, 1991, 'Moneyers in the 1130 Pipe Roll', British Numismatics Journal, vol 61

Norman Briggs, 2007, 'Weight, Coinage and the Nation', Screen [pdf: britnumsoc.org], vol 165, pp 87-93