ROMANIA, WALLACHIA Radu I circa 1377-83 copper ban

Description

Wallachia, home of the Vlachs, is considered the heartland of the Romanian people. It emerged as a Princedom in the 13th century when the local boss rebelled agains his Hungarian overlord. Later princes (voivodes) had to deal with the Ottomans, which they did by becoming vassals. After repeated Russian interventions, Wallachia joined with neighbor Moldavia to form the nucleus of modern Romania.

Modern Romania is ancient Dacia, more or less. The Romanian language is fairly close to its ancestor, Latin. There are a number of ethnic groups that have, historically, picked on each other when they were on top.

The political arrangements that resulted in the nations of modern Europe began to emerge out of anarchy starting in the 7th century AD or so. Europe, for our purposes stretches from Greenland to somewhere in Russia. Collectors of Europe would likely include Russia. Collectors of Asia, even though about 2/3 of Russia is in Asia, probably not.

By “Modern World Coins” we mean here, generally, the round, flat, shiny metal objects that people have used for money and still do. “Modern,” though, varies by location. There was some other way they were doing their economies, and then they switched over to “modern coins,” then they went toward paper money, now we’re all going toward digital, a future in which kids look at a coin and say “What’s that?” We’ll say: “We used to use those to buy things.” Kids will ask “How?” The main catalog reference is the Standard Catalog of World Coins, to which the KM numbers refer.