Money in Tarnovo, 1186–1393

The Byzantine money system

Money entered the economy of the Bulgarian lands slowly. By the 9th–10th centuries the conditions existed for it to serve as a measure of value and a means of exchange and payment, but only in the late 11th and early 12th centuries, while the lands were under Byzantine rule, did a natural economy gradually give way to one run on goods and money. Crafts and trade grew in the larger towns, and dues paid in kind began to be replaced by dues in money.

The foundation was the reform of Alexios I Komnenos in 1092. At its centre stood the gold hyperpyron, with a theoretical weight of 4.59 g (1/72 of the Byzantine pound) and about 85% pure gold (22 carats). Below it, at a rate fixed by the state, the mints struck electrum and billon cup-shaped coins and flat copper tetartera. Straight after the reform one hyperpyron was worth 3 electrum trachea, 48 billon coins or about 864 copper tetartera. Under Alexios I alone the mints of Constantinople and Thessaloniki struck close to 10 million hyperpyra.

In the 12th century billon became the most used coin in the empire. Under Isaac II Angelos and above all Alexios III Angelos, because of the constant wars, it was struck in vast quantities to pay the army: some 400–500 million coins in all. To keep up such output the two emperors cut the weight and the silver content of the billon coin.

After the rising: 1186–1204

In the first years after 1186 the Bulgarian state kept the Komnenian money system. The gold hyperpyron remained the main unit, but what actually changed hands was mostly the billon of Manuel I and above all of Isaac II and Alexios III. Single Byzantine coins from Tarnovo number 137 before 1185–1186 and 226 from then until 1204. The billon of Isaac II and Alexios III grew far more sharply in the hoards, by some 19–20 times.

Yet the capital has no large treasures. They turn up mainly in southern Bulgaria and reflect the insecurity of the years of war with Byzantium. Only 4 hoards from 1186–1204 are known from Tarnovo, 253 coins in all: small sums for everyday needs.

Gold and electrum were seldom used: one hyperpyron of Andronikos I Komnenos and 6 electrum trachea of Isaac II Angelos have been found on Tsarevets. It was the same in the other Bulgarian lands, where trade at home ran on billon and copper. Only in the 1190s are Isaac II's electrum trachea commoner in central Bulgaria, probably because of the imperial treasury captured when his army was routed in the Tarnovo Balkan in 1190. Hyperpyra, with their high and steady value, travelled as large sums sealed in purses or metal vessels marked with their value.

Of all 5,178 coins of the Komnenoi and Angeloi from Tarnovo (1 gold, 6 electrum, 5,159 billon and 12 tetartera) only 6 single pieces were struck in Thessaloniki. The reason is that Constantinople struck most of the gold and billon, while Thessaloniki struck hyperpyra and copper tetartera mainly for the city and its surroundings. Besides, the campaigns of Asen and Peter were aimed at southern and south-eastern Bulgaria, near Constantinople, and the lands around Thessaloniki only partly came into the tsardom early in the 13th century.

The clipped coins

Until the early 13th century Bulgaria worked within the system Alexios I set up in 1092, and every change to it showed here too. From the early 12th century to the 1190s the value of the billon coin against the hyperpyron fell from 1:48 to 1:184. The Byzantine government deliberately issued billon with less silver and a lower weight, and since the older, more valuable coins were still in circulation it began to bring them into line with the new rate.

Towards the end of Isaac II's reign part of the billon of John II, Manuel I and Andronikos I began to be clipped. Clipping went on under Alexios III, and by about 1200 his own coins were being clipped too. Tarnovo has 750 Byzantine coins clipped in this way: they weigh 1.50–2.50 g against 3.0–4.0 g for full ones. Such coins turn up all over the country, and hoards in Bulgaria contain the trimmed-off rims themselves, a sign that the clipping was done not only in Byzantium but in the Bulgarian state as well. The practice continued after 1204.

The Bulgarian imitations

In the first years of the 13th century fewer and fewer Byzantine coins arrived while the need for money grew. That was when the so-called Bulgarian billon imitations came into mass use: copies of three types, the fourth billon coinage of Manuel I Komnenos, the billon of Isaac II Angelos and that of Alexios III Angelos. They spread across the whole Balkan peninsula.

Tarnovo has yielded 843 of them: 324 single finds and 519 from 9 hoards. What sets the capital apart is that single finds prevail, and the hoards (except Strelbishteto) hold only a few each. In southern Bulgaria it is the other way round: the imitations are gathered mostly in large treasures. Of 64 hoards with Bulgarian imitations, 21 are in northern and 33 in southern and south-western Bulgaria. Where they were found suggests these coins were struck for the army, and the treasures roughly follow the Bulgarian army's movements in the first decade of the 13th century. The many single imitations in Tarnovo, for their part, speak of a settled life and growing trade in the city.

Part of the imitations weigh on average 2.0–3.0 g, less than the 3.0–4.0 g of the Byzantine originals. By that difference one gold hyperpyron would have been worth about 250 Bulgarian imitations. After 1204 there are no written records of the state's finances, and it is hard to say how the imitations and other foreign coins stood against the hyperpyron. The Komnenian hyperpyron probably stayed the basic unit, but only as a money of account, not as a real coin.

The Latin imitations

In the second decade of the 13th century single Byzantine coins of the 12th century grew fewer in Tarnovo, and their place was taken by more Bulgarian imitations, mainly of type C, and by the first large-module Latin imitations from Constantinople and Thessaloniki. Latin coins arrived in bulk after 1213, when Bulgaria and the Latin Empire made peace. Besides the large ones, the city began to use Latin imitations of smaller size and weight, which over the following decades took over the whole of the country's money.

Under Ivan Asen II and his successors single finds rose steeply: from 366 for 1186–1204 to 3,045 for the time up to 1257, close to eight times as many. It was the result of growing crafts and trade in the capital. The many single coins show that already in the first decades of the 13th century market prices were an established thing in Tarnovo.

In 1218–1257 Tarnovo and the whole country used Latin imitations in bulk, and Thessalonian and Nicaean coins in smaller numbers. The Bulgarian gold and copper cup-shaped coins of 1230 are very few: one gold and a few dozen copper coins of Ivan Asen II are known. Over 20,000 Latin imitations have been found in present-day Bulgaria; in Tarnovo 3 copper coins of Ivan Asen II stand against 2,571 Latin imitations. The imbalance is explained by the settled habit of using the so-called trade copper coinages that Venice and Dubrovnik produced and brought in.

Clipping and cutting

In 1220–1257 clipped and cut coins circulated in bulk. Clipping, which had begun in the late 12th century, served to bring coins into line with the rate fixed by law. From the 1220s small-module Latin imitations, first weighing about 1.50 g, rose sharply in Bulgaria, a sign that many of them were struck for the Bulgarian market and that the Constantinople mint followed the Bulgarian standard.

The imitations of series C-D-U were heavier, 2.5–3.5 g, close to the billon of Alexios III, and were first struck for the people of the Latin Empire. Once in Bulgaria they proved worth more than the fixed rate and had to be brought into line. That is the main reason for the many clipped coins in circulation in 1220–1260, the work of the official financial authority. Trade was partly unregulated but under some control: in the capital at least, coins passing through the state treasury were watched. Of 642 coins of series C-D-U in Tarnovo, 590 are clipped: more than 90% passed through the hands of the authorities.

The mismatch was put right by the makers themselves: at the end of the 1210s mass striking of small-module Latin imitations began, mostly of type A, and around 1225 small-module coins of series C-D-U followed. After 1230 the coins of the Thessalonian rulers Manuel and John Komnenos Doukas, mostly small-module, rose sharply in Tarnovo. Under Theodore Komnenos Doukas Thessaloniki struck no copper as light as this (under 1.0 g, 13–15 mm). This suggests that after 1230 Thessaloniki fell into economic as well as political dependence on Bulgaria, its mint striking copper of 0.5–1.0 g to the Bulgarian standard.

In 1230–1260 there is also something not yet fully explained: coins were cut into two or more pieces. Some have put it down to the steady debasement of copper, others to the authorities. The Tarnovo coins show that the cutting followed the constantly changing weight standard, or rather the value, of the copper coin, and that it was done by ordinary people in everyday buying and selling. From some coins, full or clipped, a third, a quarter or an eighth was taken off; others were cut in half, and the pieces went back into circulation and were cut again. They were cut with shears, an axe or a chisel, and the thinner ones simply broken by hand. All of this points to the people of Tarnovo, mostly for speculation, to make more money out of what they had. By the late 1230s the authorities tried to stop it with very light copper coins, such as the Thessalonian issues of John Komnenos Doukas (series III), but these, together with the small Latin imitations, were not enough.

The crisis of the 1250s

In the 1240s and 1250s the shortage of coin for trade at home became acute. For reasons unknown the flow of Latin imitations from Constantinople and Dubrovnik dropped sharply, and imports of Thessalonian copper were cut after the Nicaean emperor John III Vatatzes took Thessaloniki in 1246. Tarnovo's developed trade needed a great deal of coin and there was nowhere to get it from. Palace coups, failed wars with Byzantium and Tatar raids pushed up direct and indirect taxes and the cost of living.

Money changing hands faster in the city made up for some of the shortage, but not all of it. The gap was also filled by the gold hyperpyra of John III Vatatzes: all 13 gold coins of this period were found in the quarters of Tsarevets where ordinary people lived.

In the early 1250s the cutting grew even more intense. The pieces became so small that they could no longer serve as a measure of value or a means of payment, and many were lost or worn away. So a coin crisis broke out in Tarnovo and elsewhere in the state: what the market needed in money no longer matched the coins there were.

Constantine Asen's reform

The crisis was overcome step by step by the monetary reform of Tsar Constantine Asen (1257–1277). Tarnovo began to produce large quantities of full-value copper coins weighing 2.0–3.0 g, more than the debased cut-down foreign coins. Constantine Asen kept the old system with a gold hyperpyron of account, probably that of John III Vatatzes (4.40 g, 15–16 carats), against which the Bulgarian copper was reckoned. Nicaean hyperpyra spread across the whole Balkan peninsula; 13 hyperpyra of John III Vatatzes have been found in Tarnovo.

The exact rate between the hyperpyron of account and Constantine Asen's copper is not known, but the heavier Bulgarian copper suggests it fell. If in the 1230s and 1240s one hyperpyron of Vatatzes was worth 350–400 copper Latin imitations, in the 1260s it was probably worth about 200–250 Bulgarian copper coins.

Constantine Asen's coinage counts as a reform because it strengthened the money in circulation: the old debased and cut-down foreign coins were abandoned, or rather thrown away. The excavations show it. At the Great Lavra, in a single spot of 2–3 square metres, rubbish pits held some 350–400 worn, cut copper coins of 1220–1250. Similar pits around the monastery of St Demetrius and on the north-west slope of Tsarevets held heaps of 50–100 pieces.

The Byzantine coins return

For close to 15 years Tarnovo's market ran on Constantine Asen's copper. Meanwhile the restored Byzantine Empire again struck gold, silver and copper cup-shaped coins, its basic unit remaining a real gold hyperpyron of 4.40–4.50 g and 15 carats. The new Byzantine coins, mainly billon cup-shaped pieces, reached Tarnovo only in the late 1260s: Michael VIII Palaiologos has 156 (159 with single finds), Constantine Asen 451 (461).

The copper coins of the pretenders to the throne, Mitso Asen and Jacob Svetoslav, also appeared in the capital. They were struck for propaganda rather than for the market. Yet their weight and size match Constantine Asen's coins, so both men kept to the money standard set by the Bulgarian authorities.

A new shortage

Towards the end of Constantine Asen's reign brisk trade again led to a shortage of coin, probably made worse by higher direct money taxes. Clipping and cutting began again. The Tarnovo financial authority tried to stop them with lighter coins (Constantine Asen's type VI), and Byzantine coins helped to some extent, but they too fell short.

In the early 1280s palace struggles, the rising of Ivaylo and above all the devastating Tatar raids hit the economy hard. Under George I Terter a coin crisis set in again, partly because of his meagre copper and silver coinage: Bulgarian copper coins fell tenfold. From George I Terter onwards flat silver coins came into use, but under him they were so few that they were hardly used. With no Bulgarian coinage in the last decade of the 13th century the billon coins of Andronikos II Palaiologos, struck in Constantinople and Thessaloniki, came in freely: Tarnovo has 301 of them.

Theodore Svetoslav's silver

Under Theodore Svetoslav an intensive coinage of silver and copper began. Both rested on a hyperpyron of account with about 12–14 carats of gold: the hyperpyron of the joint reign of Andronikos II and Michael IX Palaiologos (1295–1320). In Byzantium and in Bulgaria alike one hyperpyron, real or of account, equalled 12 flat silver coins. Theodore Svetoslav's silver was struck at 1.60 g, a standard that held until the mid-1340s. His copper cup-shaped coins weigh 1.10–1.40 g, far less than Constantine Asen's, but that was the usual standard for Bulgarian and Byzantine coins of the 14th century.

The silver was meant partly to make up for the shortage of copper, with the market served by coins of higher value. It was a far-sighted measure but it did not achieve its aim, because Theodore Svetoslav's silver and copper were not enough. So Tarnovo went on using Byzantine gold hyperpyra and copper stamena, mainly from the time of Andronikos II and Michael IX.

Foreign coins under Michael Shishman

Under Michael III Shishman Asen (1323–1330) too, Bulgarian copper fell short and the copper coins of the Palaiologoi were used in bulk. At the same time the billon tornesi of John II Orsini, despot of Epirus (1323–1335), appeared in Tarnovo and other towns. The capital has 117 of them, a great many for his short reign. Their use was probably eased by their having the same weight standard as the Bulgarian copper cup-shaped coins. Tornesi of the Principality of Achaea and the Duchy of Athens number only 3–4.

As silver gradually took hold, Venetian and Serbian silver grossi also came into use, but only 8–9 of each have been found in Tarnovo.

The upswing under Ivan Alexander

In 1330–1360 the tsardom enjoyed a marked economic upswing and stability. In the larger towns the division of labour deepened and production for the market grew, while peaceful life helped farming. All of this called for more money in trade at home and abroad.

Tsar Ivan Alexander struck vast quantities of silver and copper. He kept the silver weight standard of George I Terter and Theodore Svetoslav: his first silver issues weigh 1.50–1.60 g. His abundant coinage pushed foreign coins off the Tarnovo market. Until about 1360 silver as well as copper was used in everyday buying. Most of the silver coins are of the type 'Ivan Alexander with Michael Asen', 141 of them, and his copper, which served small trade, numbers 518.

Alongside the Bulgarian coins, Tarnovo still used the old Nicaean hyperpyra of John III Vatatzes and the hyperpyra of Andronikos II Palaiologos, but by now clipped down to 3.0–3.50 g. The lighter weight hints at how the value of the hyperpyron shifted with the rate set by the Bulgarian financial authorities.

Silver runs short

From the mid-1360s silver output fell sharply. The heavier silver coins of the 1330s and 1340s, being worth more, gradually left circulation and were hoarded. What remained in use weighed 1.0–1.20 g and was scarce, so that in the 1360s Tarnovo was short of silver. The authorities changed the weight of the 'Ivan Alexander with Michael Asen' coins several times, and each new issue was lighter.

The causes of this impoverishment of the coinage were the division of the state in 1355–1356, the Serbian and Hungarian occupation of large territories, the Turkish advance and the conquest of much of southern Bulgaria, epidemics, and the heavy cost of winning back the Black Sea fortresses.

Billon and imitations under Ivan Shishman

Unlike lands under constant Turkish attack, the large and well-fortified city offered a fairly secure life. In the 1370s Tarnovo was busy with production, as the many single finds show, and its market ran mainly on Bulgarian silver, billon and copper. Compared with 1330–1370, the last two decades of the capital saw single finds of silver fall steeply while billon and copper multiplied.

Heavy spending and the lack of silver forced a partial monetary reform: flat billon coins with an artificially raised value were issued to stand in for the missing silver. The people of Tarnovo evidently did not think much of them, since there are no large hoards of them, and like the copper they served small trade.

Features of the 13th century reappear: dozens of clipped and cut Bulgarian and foreign copper and billon coins have been found. From the mid-1360s and early 1370s fast-growing trade again outran the coin available. Despite Ivan Shishman's large issues of billon and copper they were enough neither for Tarnovo nor for the rest of his tsardom. Foreign coin had nowhere to come from: the Constantinople mint struck very little, enough only for the capital and its surroundings, and the Thessaloniki mint stopped for a time after the first Turkish occupation in the 1380s. The only 'foreign' coins in any number are the copper of Ivan Sratsimir: 43.

So in the late 1360s and early 1370s copper imitations came into use in Tarnovo beside the real coins. Most are slightly dished plates with a design on one side only. They mainly copy the copper of Ivan Alexander and Ivan Sratsimir, but often bear meaningless combinations of lines and dots; there are even blank plates, which were accepted along with the Bulgarian coins. Such imitations were also used in Vidin, Lovech, Cherven, Shumen and Drastar, a sign that the highly developed money economy of Bulgaria in the second half of the 14th century found ways, with official or imitation coins, to get the money it needed.

Bulgarian and foreign coins

The balance between Bulgarian and foreign coins in Tarnovo shifted with the needs of trade and with how much coin the Bulgarian state struck. Until the early 13th century, while the Komnenian system held, Byzantine billon was used in bulk. After 1204 the trade coinages of Venice and Dubrovnik took over, and this went on under Ivan Asen II and his successors; in 1220–1257 Thessalonian and Nicaean copper and gold were also used in part. After 1257, for 10–15 years, Constantine Asen's full-value copper drove foreign coins out entirely. From the late 13th century to about 1335, when Bulgarian coin was short, the gold hyperpyra and copper stamena of the Palaiologoi from Constantinople and Thessaloniki were used, along with many billon tornesi of John II Orsini.

Under Ivan Alexander and Ivan Shishman, when the Bulgarian coinage was at its height, Byzantine coins all but vanished from Tarnovo. The other foreign coins are silver, with very little copper: a few each from Venice, Serbia, the Golden Horde and Wallachia.

Trade with the Italian cities

The scarcity of foreign coins does not mean there was no trade with these states, or with Dubrovnik, Genoa, Pisa or Florence. The coins of the Italian cities, Serbia and Dubrovnik are rare in Bulgaria because their money and weight systems were different. Many direct and indirect written sources speak of lively Bulgarian trade not only with Byzantium but with Dubrovnik, Venice, Genoa, Florence and Serbia.

Experienced Italian and Ragusan merchants used the coins struck or current in the country they traded with, and often organised huge imitative coinages of the most used gold, silver and copper coins. In the first half of the 13th century Venice and Dubrovnik struck copper cup-shaped copies of Komnenian coins, and probably copied the gold hyperpyra of John III Vatatzes and Andronikos II Palaiologos as well. From 1261 to the end of the 14th century, when the emperors granted Venice and Genoa broad rights of free trade, gold hyperpyra steadily drained out of Byzantium and piled up with Venetian and Genoese merchants. With them Venice, Genoa and Dubrovnik traded with Byzantium, Bulgaria, Serbia, Wallachia, the Golden Horde and other states. So Byzantine hyperpyra found in Bulgaria need not point to trade with Byzantium alone, but with the Italian cities too.

Under Ivan Alexander relations between Venice and Bulgaria were settled by a sworn treaty and a confirming charter of the tsar. The treaty shows that deals, import and export duties and other dues were often reckoned in hyperpyra. These were in fact units of account, equal to a set weight of silver coins, whether Bulgarian, Venetian or other.

What the finds show

The great number of coins from Tarnovo shows that they served not only trade but the payment of taxes, fees, fines and other feudal dues, which were many in a large city. Already in the first half of the 13th century, alongside growing trade at home, much of these dues in Tarnovo was paid in money.

The finds trace a steadily growing money economy through the 12th–14th centuries, closely tied to a deeper division of labour, growing production for the market, the city's expansion and its rising population. Thanks to this, already in the first half of the 13th century Tarnovo became one of the largest centres of production and trade in the state. For all the unregulated side of its money, the central authority looked after the tsardom's finances and kept control of them: with its own coinage or with foreign coins, real or imitation, it sought to supply the money that was needed. Rises and declines showed directly in the money: at times in reforms that strengthened the coinage, at others in speculative cuts to the weight and quality of the metal.

So the coins of Tarnovo are a valuable source for the city's economic history in its years as capital: for the growth of production, the nature of its money, its trade at home and abroad, and how money did its work in the late Middle Ages.