5 lire silver coin
1871 ・ silver ・ 19th century ・ Kingdom of Italy
The 5 lire of united Italy, with the portrait of the first king, Victor Emmanuel II, and the shield of Savoy. Its standard matched the French 5 francs exactly—the silver of the Latin Monetary Union. After a thousand years of division, the peninsula at last held a single great silver coin of its own.