Chapter 17： "Silver coins" without silver

Marin had long been uncomfortable looking at the Old Kingdom of Oldenburg. With the backing of the Viking King Denmark, he did not take East Frisian into his eyes. And Denmark is also abominable, supporting the Old Kingdom of Oldenburg, resulting in Marin now unable to control the hundreds of square kilometers of land in the Jever region.

Therefore, when Marin was training in the Teutonic Kingdom, he specially asked Old Steen Sturley to send a group of Swedish officers to practice together. Right now, this group of people has learned their skills and has returned to Sweden to prepare for it. And Marin also intends to support their independent actions economically.

For this reason, the mint, which was used for casting bad coins for a long time, was started again ...

This time, Marin aimed at the Danish economy-he planned to mint millions of Danish currency ...

Oh no, it should be said that Marin did more virtue this time-he directly intends to cast a batch of counterfeit coins of Danish currency ...

Before, the inferior coins of the silver coins issued by the Principality of Saxony minted by Marin were only mixed with more lead and less silver. Calculated, it is still silver coins.

But this time, Marin thought of a good idea, ready to play a big one-he planned to directly cast a counterfeit currency of Danish silver coins without silver ...

How does it not contain silver? Copper and lead alone will not work. Just copper and lead, it becomes bronze, not like silver coins at all. Speaking of bronze, Marin remembered another kind of bronze-copper-tin alloy ...

Think of tin, Marin contacted the alloy of copper and lead that he thought of before, and thought of the alloy of lead and tin-solder ...

In the previous life, Marin went to work in the electronics factory during the summer vacation, and also soldered the circuit board with solder. Of course, he understands soldering.

The so-called solder is an alloy of lead and tin. Among them, lead content accounted for 37, tin content accounted for 63%. The appearance of the solder is silver-white, which is very nice, and looks like silver, and it is very soft.

At the same time, because of the high lead content and high density, it can be used to pretend to be silver. It's just that solder is used to impersonate sterling silver. It can be used to impersonate silver coins ... forget it ...

Because there is no high-purity silver coin in Europe at present, it is basically a silver-copper alloy, and even most of the silver coins account for half or more of the copper content.

For example, French silver coins, the silver content is almost less than 25%. No matter how low, the color of the silver coin is no longer silver-white, but will become yellow.

It is precisely because the copper content is too high, resulting in the hardness of the current silver coins are very high, and the nature of pure silver is completely different. In fact, when the Spaniards made silver dollars later, they also had to deliberately dope them with 10% copper, so that the silver dollars could maintain a certain hardness and strength, to avoid the silver dollars being too soft and easily deformed by external forces.

Therefore, it is not appropriate to use lead-tin alloy solder to impersonate silver casting silver coins. Because, too soft ...

However, adding a small amount of copper properly can increase the hardness ...

So, Marin imported a large amount of lead from southern Europe, and imported a large amount of tin from Cornwall, England, and then used the copper purchased from India to start a "counterfeiting" program ...

After calculation, Marin added 10% copper to the "silver coin" to increase the hardness of the "silver coin". Then, adjust the proportion of lead and tin to achieve the same density as the imitated silver coins. In this way, coins of the same size are as heavy as real money, the appearance is also silver-white and bright, and the hardness is not bad. It is difficult for outsiders to see. Unless ... someone burns this "counterfeit currency" with fire ...

Because the melting point of solder is very low, only 183 degrees. Even if copper is added, the melting point does not exceed 200 degrees. If the pan is used for cooking, it can reach this temperature. As long as someone puts the coins in the furnace and heats them to more than 200 degrees, they will be surprised to find that the "silver coins" melted ...

It's just that there are not many such boring people in the world who will throw silver coins into the fire to heat ...

Moreover, this time Marin was to pit Denmark, who asked Denmark to support Oldenburg ’s interference in the internal affairs of East Friesland ...

Marin quickly found a carver, carved related molds, and began to imitate the Danish Finney silver coin engraved with the surrender of Danish King Hans ...

Denmark is close to Germany. Many habits are similar to Germany. Even the most basic currencies are Mark and Finney. However, in the northern region of the Kalmar Union under the control of Denmark (Sweden and Norway), the basic currency is not Finney, but a small silver coin equivalent to Finney-? Rtug.

However, Denmark is a big country, and Congersberg in southeast Oslo, Norway is a famous big silver mine. Therefore, the silver content of the Danish currency is good, reaching about 50%. Whether it is Finnish silver coins circulated in Denmark and the Principality of Schleswig and Holstein, or Outug silver coins circulated in Norway and Sweden, the silver content is about 50%, which is very strong in the European market. .

At present, the silver coins in circulation in the Kalmar Union are mainly Finney and Otugu with the picture of Christian I. However, since the death of Christian I in 1481, Denmark has not minted such silver coins. Beginning in 1481, Denmark began to recast silver coins engraved with the head of the current King Hans, and the temporary circulation cannot catch up with the silver coins of the head of Christian I.

However, whether it is a silver coin with the image of Christian I, or an earlier coin with the image of "Margaret I", "Erik VII" or "Christopher III", it looks very old because of its long history of casting Too.

Marin pressed with a spiral mint, it must be a brand new coin. Therefore, Marin can only choose to forge a new "silver coin" engraved with the portrait of King Hans. After all, King Hans has been in power for nearly 20 years, and the official minted silver coin with his head engraved is not lacking.

However, in order to avoid accidentally hurting the economy of Sweden, an ally (Sweden is using Otugu inscribed with Christian I and King Hans), Marin decided to only imitate the Danish homeland and the Principality of Schleswig and Hols. Danish Finney silver coins in circulation in the Principality of Theine ...

Of course ~ www.novelhall.com ~ Marin's "silver coin" contains only lead, tin and copper, and does not contain silver at all, full of fake coins ...

However, but from the outside, I really can't see it. Even in terms of hardness, it is relatively ugly. Because part of the copper is added to the currency ...

When mixing, Marin was surprised. The melting points of lead and tin are more than three hundred degrees and two hundred degrees respectively, but their boiling points are all over a thousand Baidu or even over two thousand degrees. Therefore, copper and them can be smoothly integrated. If it is replaced with zinc, although the melting point is higher than that of lead and tin, reaching more than 400 degrees, the boiling point of zinc can be lower, and when it reaches more than 900 degrees, it will become zinc vapor and volatilize, which is difficult to merge with copper. Of course, it is easy to integrate with lead and tin.

After several attempts, Marin's Mint successfully developed a "silver coin" that does not contain silver. Then, Marin directly issued the production task-casting 2 million Danish Finneys, impacting the Danish market ...

The machine-made coins produced by the Marin Mint do not contain high-priced silver, so the cost is very low. Even the prices of lead and tin are lower than copper at this time. Therefore, the cost of such counterfeit currency is lower than that of silver-copper alloy counterfeit currency. The production of 2 million pieces will make Marin profitable ...

The only drawback of this kind of counterfeit currency is that it cannot be exposed to high temperatures. Once the high temperature of nearly two Baidus is encountered, the currency will soften or even liquefy. However, this year, generally no one is crazy to throw coins into the fire. A small temperature of over a hundred degrees is not exposed. Only the high temperature of nearly two Baidus of the fire can test the problem. By the time the counterfeit currency was discovered, Marin had already shipped. If it is really found, it is the Danish market that finally confuses. And this is what Marin wants to see ...