La Capitana Shipwreck - 4 Reales - Counter-stamped with a Crown on Cross side.
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Denomination: 4 Reales
Assayer: "O" (Rosa the wheel)
Weight: 11.89 g
Mint: Potosi, Bolivia
Reign: Philip IV
Date: Not visible
Grade: Fine
Description: Potosi Scandal cob. Obverse: Crown Marked (Crown visible). Type C, Rarity scale R2. Greek cross with bold lions and castles in three quadrants. Reverse: Hapsburg Shield clearly visible along with the Mint mark ("P") and Assayer Mark ("O" with a dot in the center) – “Rosa the wheel”
Mount: There are 20 hours of custom bench work on this coin. The bezel is sterling silver. The Skull prongs are 14K. The dagger is sterling and the handle is hand wrapped gold wire. The skull has a Ruby eye with a 14K eye patch that looks like you can take it right off!
History: The wreck of the Capitana, or the lead ship of the Spanish South Seas (Pacific) Fleet, would become the largest loss ever experienced by the Spanish armada. After striking the Punta Santa Elena reefs, The Jesus María de la Limpia Concepción lost a reported 3,000,000 pesos of silver. Due to the unregistered cargo that was stored atop the anchor cables and foredeck, the crew was unable to use the anchors for safe stoppage. For context, the entire annual silver production in Peru was around 6-7 million pesos, suggesting that the Concepción was carrying almost one and a half years of peso production. Spanish managed to salvage a vast majority of the lost 'official' 3 million pesos and would later recover even more coins. After equally splitting the recovered coins with the Ecuadorian government in 1998, officially around 2,500 coins would appear at auction in 1999. These were almost exclusively Potosí 8 and 4 Reales that were in excellent condition, including countermarked issues (1649-1652), transitional issues of 1652, and post-transitional pillars-and-waves cobs (1653-1654).
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