Replica of Ferdinand I Czech thaler model standard

The marriage of Ferdinand I Habsburg and Anne Jagellonica in 1521 was the third of four marriages that gave rise to the large empire of the Habsburg House in three generations. It was Ferdinand I himself who in 1526 – when he was elected the Czech and Hungarian king –laid the foundations of the central European Habsburg monarchy which lasted almost 400 years. Under his reign, the groschen were gradually replaced with tolars. In 1528 he deprived the Šlik family of the coinage right and began to strike tolars in the Jáchymov mint. In Prague the tolars were introduced in 1535, in Kutná Hora in 1543. In 1547, the last Prague groschen were minted ending the history of the best known Czech currency. Trying to unify the currency throughout the empire Ferdinand introduced a new currency in his lands between 1559 and 1661, so-called guids, which however did not last long and in 1573 were again replaced with tolars.