Vereinsthaler

The Vereinsthaler (German: [fɛɐ̯ˈʔaɪnsˌtaːlɐ], union thaler) was a standard silver coin of the German Confederation, used in most German states and the Austrian Empire in the years before German unification. The Vereinsthaler was introduced in 1857 to replace the various versions of the North German thaler, many of which were already set at par with the Prussian thaler. While the earlier Prussian thaler was slightly heavier at 1⁄14th a Cologne mark of fine silver (16.704 grams), the Vereinsthaler contained 16+2⁄3 grams of silver, which was indicated on the coins as one-thirtieth of a metric pound (Pfund, equal to 500 grams). The Hanseatic city-states of Bremen, Hamburg and Lübeck had not joined the Dresden Coinage Convention of 1838 and also stayed out of the Vienna Monetary Treaty of 1857, a choice usually put down to trade ties that reached well beyond Germany's borders; as a result, Hamburg, Bremen and Lübeck never minted Vereinsthalers of their own. Even so, the 1873 Coinage Act required German one- and two-thaler coins to be accepted throughout the empire at three marks per thaler until they were formally withdrawn, which allowed Vereinsthalers to continue circulating in Bremen, Hamburg and Lübeck after unification even though none of the three cities had ever belonged to the monetary union that issued them.