The Spanish dollar, also known as the piece of eight

I found this in one of David's drawers. Minted in Mexico, SPANISH COLONY 8 Reales 1793 TH Charles IV(1788-1808). Obverse: Armored bust of Charles IIII right. Inscription: CAROLUS • IIII • DEI • GRATIA •. Reverse: Crowned shield flanked by pillars with banner. Legend: • HISPAN • ET IND • REX • ... Silver. Old patina. David looks like the more worn coin below.

It is not worth a lot of money, but it is weird to hold a coin that you know was used many, many times in 1793! His is all marked up and I thought, oh, it is really damaged. BUT these marks are called "chopmarks" and were used to authenticate the coin. he punch used to create the chopmark could penetrate the thin silver out coating of these counterfeits and reveal the coin to be the fraud it was! Chop marked coins are (in my opinion) just bursting with character. The marks and resultant effect of the coin makes the coin itself a relic of another era where international trade depended on the quality of the silver rather than on electronic fund transfers. 

The chopmarks are exotic and strange an often completely at odds with the design of the coin they are on, providing an interesting contrast in the cultures of the time. One can only imagine English traders in the early 19th Century bartering for silk and porcelain from Chinese traders using Spanish colonial silver purchased with English silver or even stolen from Spanish ships by English privateers! These sorts of coins are, to me at least, part of what coin collecting is all about. So interesting and a minute to learn something new.