The Cour des monnaies (, ''Currency Court'') was one of the

sovereign court A ''parlement'' (), under the French Ancien Régime, was a provincial appellate court of the Kingdom of France. In 1789, France had 13 parlements, the oldest and most important of which was the Parlement of Paris. While both the modern Fr ...

s of ''

Ancien Régime ''Ancien'' may refer to * the French word for "ancient, old" ** Société des anciens textes français * the French for "former, senior" ** Virelai ancien ** Ancien Régime ** Ancien Régime in France ''Ancien'' may refer to * the French word for ...

'' France. It was set up in 1552. It and the other ''Ancien Régime'' tribunals were suppressed in 1791 after the

French Revolution The French Revolution ( ) was a period of radical political and societal change in France that began with the Estates General of 1789 and ended with the formation of the French Consulate in coup of 18 Brumaire, November 1799. Many of its ...

Origins

The regulation of coin-making was royal regulation ''par excellence'' and very soon became the object of strict surveillance and dedicated judicial institutions. Monetary crimes were particularly severely punished, and

coin clipping Coin debasement is the act of decreasing the amount of precious metal in a coin, while continuing to circulate it at face value. This was frequently done by governments in order to inflate the amount of currency in circulation; typically, some o ...

and counterfeiting could be punishable by death. At first monetary justice was exercised by ''généraux des monnaies'', but in 1346 this passed to a dedicated Chambre des monnaies, set up in 1358 at the

Palais de la Cité The Palais de la Cité (), located on the Île de la Cité in the Seine River in the centre of Paris, is a major historic building that was the residence of the Kings of France from the sixth century until the 14th century, and has been the center ...

in buildings adjoining the

Chambre des comptes Under the French monarchy, the Courts of Accounts (in French ''Chambres des comptes'') were sovereign courts specialising in financial affairs. The Court of Accounts in Paris was the oldest and the forerunner of today's French Court of Audit. ...

. Appeals against sentences passed in the ''Chambre des monnaies'' were taken to the Parlement until January 1552, when the ''Chambre'' was turned into a sovereign court called the ''Cour des monnaies''. The pioneering historian of the French language and medieval French literature, Claude Fauchet, served as President of the ''Cour des monnaies'' from 1581 to 1599.

Organisation (1552–1791)

From 1552 the ''Cour des monnaies'' was the supreme and sovereign authority on all civil law and criminal law relating to: *''ratione materiae'', the act of coin-making and by extension all use of gold and silver *''ratione personae'', judging all those who worked or sold these precious metals (moneyers, money-changers, goldsmiths, miners, gold-beaters,

foundry A foundry is a factory that produces metal castings. Metals are cast into shapes by melting them into a liquid, pouring the metal into a mold, and removing the mold material after the metal has solidified as it cools. The most common metals pr ...

-workers, jewellers, etc.) The office of ''prévôté générale des monnaies'' was set up by an edict of June 1635 to support the ''Cour des monnaies'' in its administrative and policing functions throughout its jurisdiction. That jurisdiction was originally equivalent to that of the ''Parlement de Paris'', but did not in the 18th century include the territories later annexed to the kingdom of France (governed by the parliaments of Metz and Pau and by the ''Chambre des comptes de Dole'') as well as the ''généralités'' reliant on the ''Cour des monnaies de Lyon'', set up in 1704 and suppressed in 1771.

Bibliography

* Jacques Bouclier, ''La Cour des monnaies de Paris à la fin de l’Ancien Régime'', Paris, 1924

External links

*
Monetary ordinances of the Ancien régime
* {{in lang, fr}
Archives nationales
1552 establishments in France 1791 disestablishments Economic history of the Ancien Régime