Sale: CNG 61, Lot: 2200. Estimate $1500.  Closing Date: Wednesday, 25 September 2002.  Sold For $1750. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

CHARLEMAGNE. 768-814. AR Denier (1.64 gm). Milan mint. Struck 793/4-812. +CARLVS REX FR, cross / +M•EDIOL, Carolus monogram. Depeyrot 662f; MEC 743 var.; M&G 212 var.; CNI V pg. 5, 28. Toned, good VF. ($1500)

After the establishment of the Lombard capital at Pavia in 569 Milan remained the center of Italian opposition to foreign conquest. The Lombards were Arians, and the archbishops of Milan from the days of Ambrose had always been orthodox. When the Lombard kingdom fell to the Franks in 774 and Desiderius was dismissed to a monastery, the archbishops of Milan were strengthened by the close alliance between Charlemagne and the papacy, which tended to confirm their temporal authority, and also by Charlemagne’s policy of breaking up the great Lombard fiefs and dukedoms. Under the confused government of Charlemagne’s immediate successors the archbishop remained the only real power in Milan, as was the case with the bishop of Rome, the pope.