THE TOPOGRAPHY OF FINDINGS OF COINS OF THE STATE OF THE TEUTONIC ORDER IN PRUSSIA AND ITS LIVONIAN BRANCH IN UKRAINE (SUMMARISED INFORMATION BY REGIONS).

The process of formation and development of the inter-state relations of the Ukrainian
medieval lands with the state of the Teutonic Order in Prussia is represented mainly in written
sources of the second half of the XIII – beginning of the XVI century, and particularly in
documents. However, these relations should have left a mark not only in written sources. The
relations, even if they were occasional, leave a sufficient number of numismatic sources in the
cultural layers of settlements. In this case they are the Teutonic coins which were lost by their
owners in their time. The purpose of the article is to study and introduce into scientific circulation
the corpus of numismatic sources which reflect the relations of the Ukrainian medieval lands with
the State of the Teutonic Order in Prussia. The main numismatic sources are the coin findings with
the coins and materials and tools for coin mining. Coin findings allow enhancing the existing
concepts of money circulation and trade relations as well as sometimes these findings change the
established stereotypes. Let us turn to the problem of coins of the State of the Crusaders – the State
of the Teutonic Order in Prussia, and the monetary circulation in the medieval Ukraine.
The coins of the Teutonic Order are found in Ukraine as one of a kind as well as in money
and material hoards. This problem has been studied in the scientific literature. The first information
about such findings appeared in the second half of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries,
particularly in the works of K. Strashkevych, in the materials of the Archaeological Congresses.
The Ukrainian Soviet historiography ignored the presence of the Teutonic coins in the monetary
circulation of Ukrainian medieval lands, as well as the findings of these coins in Ukraine. Recent
decades have brought the processes of rethinking of the historical past. The study of the problems
of the history of the state of the Teutonic Order in Prussia, including the relations of this state with
the rulers and the population of medieval Ukraine, was also no exception. In modern Ukrainian
historiography, some aspects of the problem of finding the coins of the State of the Teutonic Order
in Prussia on the territory of Ukraine are reflected in the works of H. Ivakin, A. Pozikhovskyi and
R. Shust, S. Demydko, O. Pohorilets and S. Stopenchuk, A. Shestopal, R. Savvov, V. Orlyk and
others. In addition to the works mentioned above, the information about coin findings of the State
of the Teutonic Order in Prussia in Ukraine can be found in various sources: archival documents,
museum collections, confirmations of ethnographers and materials of forum for treasure hunters.
The investigation of coin findings of the State of the Teutonic Order in Prussia on the
territory of modern Ukraine makes it possible to conclude about the relations (mostly economic) of
its medieval lands with the Teutonic Order and the presence of the Order coins in circulation in
Ukrainian territories in the XIV-XV centuries. The problem we encountered requires further
scientific development. First of all, a detailed study of the numismatic collections of the National
Museum of History of Ukraine, regional and district local history museums, reports of the Institute
of Archaeology of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, published documents of the XIVXV
centuries, funds of the Central State Historical Archives of Ukraine in the cities of Kyiv and
Lviv, as well as Torun city archives, Gdansk, Kaliningrad (Königsberg) and others. Thus, for
further comprehensive study of the relations of the Ukrainian medieval lands with the state of the
Teutonic Order in Prussia, it is necessary to use various sources including numismatic ones. And
the topography of the findings of coins undoubtedly holds a significant place.