2 Reales Rafael Carrera

Rafael Carrera ruled Guatemala as a largely illiterate mestizo caudillo who had risen from pig-herding obscurity to become the dominant political force in Central America — a biographical arc that deeply unsettled the liberal elite whose coinage this displaced. His 1854 declaration of himself as president for life formalized what had been true in practice for years, and the coins bearing his name were instruments of that authority rather than incidental products of it.

KM#134 was struck at the Casa de Moneda in Guatemala City across two calendar years, with documented variation in die execution between the 1860 and 1861 issues.