Pistole
Pistole is the French name given to a Spanish gold coin in use from 1537; it was a double escudo, the gold unit. The name was also given to the Louis d'Or of Louis XIII of France, and to other European gold coins of about the value of the Spanish coin.
One pistole was worth approximately ten livres or three écus, but higher figures are also seen.[Select Tracts and Documents Illustrative of English Monetary History 1626-1730] The derivation is uncertain; the term may come from the Czech píšťala ("whistle", a term for a hand cannon), or from the Italian town of Pistoia; either way, it was originally spelled pistolet and originated in military slang, and probably has the same root as pistol.
A small number of gold pistoles and double pistoles were minted in Ireland in 1646, during the Irish Confederate Wars and the reign of Charles I. James Butler, 1st Duke of Ormond authorised the issue in order to prevent troop defections, as there was a shortage of silver coins for paying soldiers. The coins had an approximate value of 13 shillings; they are today worth over £65,000, as only eleven examples are known to survive.[Coins, Tokens and Historical Medals (15 - 18 September 2015) - Dix Noonan Webb|website=www.dnw.co.uk]
They are the only gold coins ever struck in Ireland, except for a small number of proof and ECU
The coins (also called "pieces" or "pledges") did not bear any royal symbols, simply their weight on both sides.
The coin appears repeatedly in Dumas' fiction. He has his character state, in The Three Musketeers set in the 1620s, that one hundred pistoles were worth a thousand livres tournois when Athos bargains for the horse he takes to the battle of La Rochelle.
The coin gave its name to the town of Trois-Pistoles, Quebec, where according to local legend an explorer lost a goblet worth three pistoles in the river.[www.toponymie.gouv.qc.ca]
