Hi, I'm doing some research on early Spanish firearms. I found (in a book) a contract for the production of a type of musket in 1535. The contract specifies that the weight of the powder charge should be equal to the weight of the lead ball (projectile) PLUS "half the weight of a silver Real de Castilla" . I don't know anything about coins. My questions are: 1. Does anyone know the weight of a silver Real de Castilla from 1535 or so? 2. How does a Real de Castilla differ from a standard Real of that era? 3. I was able to purchase a 1/2 Real coin from 1755. Would the weight of this coin accurately represent the 50% of the weight of a Silver Real de Castilla? Any help will be appreciated. Thank you, Alec Jason
Alec- Welcome to CoinTalk! Hope you'll stick around and develop a fascination with other little round pieces of metal besides just musketballs. "Castilla" refers to Castile, or the region known as Castile and León in Spain. As you have deduced, a "real" is a type of coin. While I don't know the type and mint of your 1755 half-real, most of those that I am aware of weighed in the neighborhood of 1.7 grams (I looked up a Spanish homeland type and the Mexican colonial type, for example, and saw both listed at 1.69 grams.) I couldn't find any Castilian 1-real coins from around 1535, but here's one from the late 1400s. It lists at 3.4 grams, as do all the similar types I saw, and that's twice the weight of the 1.7 grams of a half-real, so there you go. I had initially thought your mid-1700s half-real would have been struck to a different standard than the late-medieval coins of the late 15th and early 16th centuries, but maybe that's not the case. It seems the weight stayed pretty consistent up into the mid-18th century, at least in the examples I was able to look up. I suspect the coins of Castile & Leon would not have differed much in weight from their counterparts from other areas of Spain, but I don't know for sure. Perhaps someone with more specialized knowledge of 16th century Spanish coins will be able to say more. But it sounds to me like you'd need to charge your musket with enough powder to match the weight of the lead musketball plus 1.7 grams. Regards, ~Robertson ("Rob") Shinnick (aka "LordM")
Rob, That's fantastic information. Just what I need. If the Real coin was 3.4 grams in the late 14th century and the same weight in the 1700-1800's than I'm confident the Real was the same weight in 1535. Great. Thank you very much for your information. Alec Jason
Here are some reales from my current "Eclectic Box" collection, though I've had many others over the years. There are worse things to collect, y'know. Bolivia (Spanish Colonial): silver "cob" type 1-real coin of Charles II, 1694 VR, Potosí mint PCGS VF25; population 1 - the only example graded by PCGS as of 6/16/2018. Mexico (Spanish Colonial): silver 8 reales ("Pillar Dollar"), 1761-Mo-MM, Mexico City mint PCGS AU50; population 4 with 11 higher as of 6/16/2018. And here is a 1787 Mexico City half-real I found here on St. Simons Island, GA, while metal detecting. Found a 1776 with a hole in it just a few feet away.
Wow -- that's fantastic. To find a Spanish coin on the island. What a thrill that must have been. No, nothing at all wrong with collecting coins. The more I learn about them, the more interesting they are. Alec Jason
Stick around. "Hobby of Kings", and all that, y'know. Nice thing about numismatics is that you don't have to be a king or spend a fortune to join the hobby these days, and thanks to the Web, there's all kinds of information at one's fingertips. Click the link below my signature line banner and join this month's giveaway. Maybe you can win some stuff at the end of the month.
This Reale came from the South Carolina coast. You can Google Daniel Sedgwick. He has volumes of information available on his website. And hopefully @BlackBeard_Thatch will show up and offer up his knowledge. Edit.... One thought occurred to me in direct respond to your question. My history may be off, but I believe that by 1755 the Reale's that were minted were milled coins. A 1600's era Reale would have been a cobb or hand struck coin. However the weight should have still been consistent.
Oh, I don't need to Google Sedwick. One of my detecting buddies consigned a local find to him. I saw this thing before Sedwick ever did, right after my buddy dug it. I know where the secret find site is, too. My friend said he thought it was a chunk of lead at first (it was heavy like that), but then he saw the Spanish stamp on it and rubbed the grey ground patina a bit with his thumb and saw it was silver underneath. He bought a new, state-of-the-art Minelab detector with some of the proceeds of that sale, and promptly went out on the beach and found a modern $10K platinum and diamond ring with the new machine. He has always been the luckiest schmuck I know, despite having had a somewhat rough upbringing. But it ain't just luck, of course. The guy is a super-skilled, Jedi-class relic hunter.
I believe its referencing to a Reale because any powder charge larger than Reale size would be risky in my eyes. I think it was referencing Real de Castilla as a reference as what the standard was(Meaning the weight of reales were constant and never underweight which was frequently always the case at the Mexico mint), maybe even a pop culture reference as a popular location in Spain at the time.
The powder charge specified in the contract calls for 328 grains of powder (the weight of the .62 caliber ball) PLUS the 26 grains (half the weight of a Real) = 384 total grains of black powder. This is a huge, excessive powder charge with modern gunpowder. The powder back then must have been much, much weaker. I'm still researching the powder formulation.
I don't recall, but it might have been .58 caliber or so (circa mid-19th century, I'd guess). Don't think it was .69 or .75 like some of the colonial stuff? Oh, speaking of early firearms, look at this awesome "grotesque" silver pistol pommel that was found by my same friend who dug that Spanish silver ingot. Now look at this early 18th century Queen Anne period Barbar pistol, with a nearly identical "gargoyle" face pommel!
My relic buddies hunt some interesting sites. Some of these reales came up on the same site as that pistol pommel, I think. 1803 Mexico City 8-reales piece (halved to make change) An earlier 1746 1-real piece, unfortunately corroded. Some 1798 US large cents in remarkably good preservation, both of the Sheldon-166 variety with its telltale reverse die break.
Wow! That's a great find. How did you connect piece to a firearm? I would not have had any idea what it was.
The two halves shown in that picture are opposite sides of the same piece (which is one half of an 1803-Mo 8-reales coin).
