moneyer

Latin, monetarius.

Moneyers were responsible for the regular re-coinages which were an important feature of the English monetary system and one the strengths of the Anglo-Saxon administrative system. The disproportionate number of English moneyers recorded in Domesday probably reflects the dependence of the Normans upon English expertise, even two decades after the Conquest.

Moneyers were substantial men, often burgesses in the major towns. Domesday Book, records, for instance, that at Wallingford the moneyer had a house free of taxation 'so long as he coins money'. The exemption was worth £11 a year, a significant sum of money (BRK B1). A free house went with the job at Oxford, too (OXF B10).

The 16 entries concerning moneyers in Domesday Book provide a good idea of how the re-coinages worked. The most informative are those for Hereford, Worcester and Shrewsbury, that for Hereford being particularly so. According to this entry, when a re-coinage was ordered, the moneyers paid 18 shillings for new dies and 20 shillings to the king (HEF C9). The Worcester entry reveals that the moneyers had to go to London for the dies (WOR C1), and the entry for Shrewsbury that the payment to the king was due 'on the fifteenth day' (SHR C11). The informative Worcester entry adds that 'when the king came to the city, the moneyers made him as many pence as he wanted', at his expense, however. When a moneyer died, his heirs paid 20 shillings in relief; if he were intestate, 'the king had all his wealth'.

For the Domesday moneyers, see Anthony Freeman, The moneyer and the mint in the reign of Edward the Confessor, 1042-66 (1985); and D.M. Metcalf, 'The taxation of moneyers under Edward the Confessor', Domesday studies, edited by J.C. Holt (1987), pages 279-93; and for more detail on the monetary system, R.H.M. [Michael] Dolley, The Norman Conquest and the English coinage (1966), and Sally P.J. Harvey, Domesday: Book of Judgement (2013), chapter 6 and appendix 1..

See also mint.