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4 Maravedis - Carlos II
| Issuer | Royal Mint of Spain (Real Casa de la Moneda) |
|---|---|
| Year | 1691 |
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| Composition | Log in to see details |
| Weight | 3.3 g |
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|---|---|
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| Reverse description | Central field bears the IHS Christogram monogram surmounted by a crown, struck in moderately bold relief on the irregular copper flan. The monogram, referencing the Society of Jesus and widely used as a pious device on Spanish vellon coinage of this period, is flanked by the date 1691 and the mintmaster or assayer initial. The legend ORAN appears in the field, referencing the city of Oran, a Spanish possession in North Africa for which this issue was intended. The flan edges are irregular and the fields show typical hammered surface texture. |
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| Mint | (M) Royal Mint of Spain (Real Casa de la Moneda), Madrid, Spain (1591-date) |
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| Additional information |
Carlos II, last of the Spanish Habsburgs, presided over a currency system in near-constant crisis. The 1680s and 1690s saw repeated royal decrees reselling and restamping existing copper coinage — vellon — as the crown scrambled to extract revenue from metal already in circulation. Many pieces from this period are countermarked or resello'd rather than freshly struck, and the lightweight specification of this issue reflects the reductions imposed by the pragmatic of 1686, which halved the legal weight of copper maravedis.