Sweden Silver Medal 1707 - Guarantee of Free Religious Exercise for the Silesian Protestants, 1 September 1707 - Karl XII (1697–1718)

7.09g. 26mm. UNC/UNC. 

Medalier: Bengt Richter (Below truncation, engraver’s initial R). 

Delzanno (SKM) 189 RR - 6-10 known exemplars in private collections. 7500 SEK for AU (01). Hildebrand 119. 

Very rare. 

Obv.: Right-facing bust of King Charles XII, draped. 

Inscription around: 

PIVS · LIBERTATIS · VINDEX · 

(The pious defender of liberty). 

Rev.: A head emerging from clouds blows upon a wet field of grain with fallen ears, which rise again. 

Inscription around: 

DEIECTIS · LEVAMEN · AFFERT · 

(He brings relief to those cast down). 

This medal commemorates the guarantee of free religious exercise for the Protestant population of Silesia, today largely in Poland, secured through the intervention of the Swedish king Charles XII on 1 September 1707. At the time, Silesia belonged to the Habsburg Monarchy, and the question of Protestant rights had become one of the central confessional issues in the region. By pressing the Habsburg emperor during the Great Northern War, Charles XII helped obtain concessions for the Silesian Protestants and protection against interference by the Catholic clergy. The imagery of the wind reviving the flattened grain symbolizes the restoration and renewal of a religious community that had been oppressed.