ineffectual.
The depreciation against which it vainly strove was not confined to the lower species, such as pfennige and heller. The close of the thirteenth century had witnessed the introduction of a new large silver money, which for a time stood by the side of the schilling, and then gradually displaced it. The new coin—the groschen, minted in imitation of the gros Tournois of France—made its first appearance in Bohemia in 1296, when its tale was 63 1⁄2 to the mark, 15 loth fine. The same process of depreciation at once began to affect it, and during the fourteenth century the downward course of the coin was very rapid, especially in Saxony (see Tables infra, and pp. 30, 97). With the commencement of a gold coinage in the middle of the same century, a third element of confusion was introduced, and quickly