Forgery of the French Coinage: The Question of the Counterfeit Money in the Southern Low Countries, 1710–1730

Abstract

This chapter shows how under Louis XIV and the Regency, French monetary policy to fund war and refinance war debts turned the banking and merchant communities into manufacturers of counterfeit money in the Southern Low Countries in the years 1710–1730. It examines the attitudes of the merchants and the Brussels authorities towards the forgery of French money, in particular the connivance of marquis de Prie, governor of the Low Countries in counterfeiting activities. It documents the extent of the fraud and the networks involved in counterfeiting, as well as the reasons for the indulgent stance of the commission of enquiry set up in 1725–1726. Overall, in the absence of a central bank, the experience of counterfeit money forced the sovereign to voluntarily peg his currency to the French currency.