Post your Spanish reale cobs....

I have 3 left of the specimens I had collected over the years . I have a 4 reale from the 1715 fleet ,and a 6 reale from the Atocha wreak both jewlery mounted.
The first one is a specimen is from the Atocha an 8 reale discovered by Mel Fisher...I sold this a few years back to John Call.

 

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The next is an 8 reale beach wreak Johanna off South Africa, this c cob was purchased by none other than Lord M

 

The next specimen was actually minted in Seville Spain its still in my collection and shows how cobs were cut and shaved to make payment for goods and services,
What most dont understand is most minted were 8 reales... very few 4 and 6 reales..so the term pieces of 8 as cobs were cut to make change.

 

Dang Paddy.... I only have half the image at my office. This showed up on a South Carolina beach shortly after hurricane Hugo beat us half to death.

 

This is a 4 reale from the 1715 fleet.

Florenzada cross 1572-1733 Mexico silver coins only.

 

Post the rev later and I'll tell you the attribution .
The obv. Is the Jeruslem cross 1652 -1772 Mexico,& late Lima & Potosi
The Jerusalem cross was also used by the Santa Fe de Bogota mint And this makes sense as to where you found it the cross appears in gold coinage recoved from the 1715 fleet . Off central Florida.
So that why its so beat traveling that far up the Atlanic seaboard.

 

I found it in an old thread and updated my post

 

You are absolutely correct.
Each 8 Real coin would typically be cut into 4 pieces or more, with the pieces referred to as " bits ".
As the 4 piece cut was the most common, it brought about the use of the phrase "Two Bits" to describe one of those cut pieces, along with a multitude of other useful phrases such as " not worth two bits " and my favorite :
" Two Bits, Four Bits, Six Bits, A Dollar
If you like Reals, Just stand up and Holler "

 

M = mexico mint
R = Baltasar Ramos Leceta. assayer Philp V. Date1700 - 1746 the 1715 fleet coin for sure.

 

Very Cool!! It certainly spent plenty of time on the ocean floor.

 

Oh without a doupt but what strange....its not crusted over....silver cobs look like an Oreo cookie under the sea they crust,gold looks the same no matter if under 1 day or 1000 years does not get crusty ...now that cob hit a lot of rough surf to break it out of said crust.
A once and life time find....thanks for sharing.

 

Nice cobs! I see a hint of a date on the Seville coin, possibly the bottoms of two 2s, which would make the coin's date (16)22, but the strike is typically crude, so it is hard to say definitively that is the date.

I've got quite a few cobs, accumulated over the past decades. Here are three.

Lima, 8 escudos, 1750 R, ex Luz salvage, purchased from Pat Johnson




Potosi, 8 reales, 1617 M, from the Atocha Reference Collection (but no certificate!)

27.2 grams




Potosi, 8 reales, 1652 E, transitional, shield reverse

 

These are at the top of my list for coins I need to add to my collection. The history is just so amazing!! Especially the shipwreck coins.

 

Back in 89 we spent our holiday in Key West , met Mel Fisher and of course visited his museum.
My wife actually bumped into him ...any way there was a cob she fell in love with....$1100.00 in a setting exactly like this one. She was on the fence about spending that much.
Well somewhere on the sea hwy between Key West and Miami she sez I really wish I had purchased that cob......
Fast forward her 50th bday I found a 6 reale and that wasn't easy plenty of 8's ...any way my jewler buddy set the the emerald and cob exactly like the one Mel was selling.
6 reale Atocha cob. Doubled struck

 

Good stuff! Lately I've been studying the Potosi Mint Scandal and the effect it had on the world economy. I'd like examples of the earlier debased coinage and the later less-debased issues, but finding coins with decent detail that don't cost an arm and a leg is proving to be a challenge.

 

Here's one more 8 reales cob.

Due to a debasement scandal at the Potosi Mint, cobs struck in the 1630s and particularly the 1640s to 1651 were countermarked and devalued to 7 1/2 reales by the Crown.

There are a number of different countermarks. This example, a cob of 1651, assayer E, has the crown in a beaded circle countermark on the shield side, bold and in the middle.

1652 saw the introduction of a totally new design, replacing the shield with a pillars and waves design, a design that remained until the last year of cob production for the Potosi mint in 1773.

This coin is KM C19.15 (rare).

26.4 grams

 

I agree John I've had several Cazdor coins they are reasonable but not a true cob.
If you ever have the chance to visit Key West you got to see Mels treasures.
The emerald cross with Saint Anthony etched in the back is unbelievable! Emeralds the size of dimes crystal clear....how many emerals have you seen "clear" no inclusions what so ever.
Now I do understand somebody got the 1 gold bar out of the wall....they had a bar assayed the size of a thick table knife. It was in a plexiglass wall display which you could put your hand in an actually touch and lift the bar up. ...to feel its weight. The gold chains were unreal.....as to advoid taxes they wore their gold in large links that could easy be bent open and cut to pay for goods and services.
I was like a kid in a candy store.....

 

I picked this one up yesterday. Slab photo for size reference. I liked the counterstamp and irregularity of the planchet.

 

I do appreciate your postings...some nice cobs... I hate to say it but very sorry that I sold the other 2 8's.
But their proceeds went towards my half dimes.... and afforded me some nice die marriages.
I must admit when I see one in a case at a show I'm all eyes...As Rob just purchased a nice pillar dollar,the last show I could of scored one AU 58 in an "old pci photo slab."it was very tempting but lost out to an vf 35 1869 IHC.
Thanks again for your post to the thread.

 

Now I hate you.... showing me that omg wow! Thats so cool...I like SA /CA coinage to begin with.
Another for the want list....