Wikipedia

This text was copied from Wikipedia on 10 October 2024 at 6:11AM.

Silver dollar of the Catholic Monarchs, after 1497
Reverse
FERNANDVS ET ELISABET DEI GR[ATIA]
"Ferdinand and Elisabeth, by the Grace of God"
Displays the arms of the Catholic Monarchs post 1492, with Granada in base. Letter S on the left is the sign of the mint of Seville and VIII on the right i.e. eight in roman numerals.
Obverse
REX ET REGINA CASTELE LEGIONIS A[RAGONIS]
"King and Queen of Castile, Leon, Aragon…"
Displays the personal emblems of the monarchs: Isabella's yoke and Ferdinand's arrows.
Silver dollar of Philip V of Spain, 1739
Reverse
VTRAQUE VNUM M[EXICO] 1739
"Both (are) one, Mexico [City Mint], 1739"
Displays two hemispheres of a world map, crowned between the Pillars of Hercules adorned with the PLUS VLTR[A] motto.
Obverse
PHILIP[PUS] V D[EI] G[RATIA] HISPAN[IARUM] ET IND[IARUM] REX
"Philip V, by the Grace of God, King of the Spains and the Indies"
Displays the arms of Castile and León with Granada in base and an inescutcheon of Anjou.
Silver dollar of Ferdinand VI of Spain, 1753
Reverse
VTRAQUE VNUM M[EXICO] 1753 M
"Both (are) one, Mexico [City Mint], 1753." Displays two hemispheres of a world map, crowned between the Pillars of Hercules adorned with the PLUS VLT[R]A motto.
Obverse
FERD[INA]ND[US] VI D[EI] G[RATIA] HISPAN[IARUM] ET IND[IARUM] REX
"Ferdinand VI, by the Grace of God, King of the Spains and the Indies"
Displays the arms of Castile and León with Granada in base and an inescutcheon of Anjou.
Silver dollar of King Charles IV of Spain, 1806
Obverse
CAROLUS IIII DEI GRATIA 1806 "Charles IV by the Grace of God, 1806." Right profile of Charles IV in soldier's dress with laurel wreath. It was under the reign of this monarch that the United States Mint began the U.S. silver dollar in 1794.
Reverse
HISPAN[IARUM] ET IND[IARUM] REX M[EXICO] 8 R[EALES] T H"King of the Spains and the Indies, Mexico [City Mint], 8 Reales." Crowned Spanish coat of arms between the Pillars of Hercules adorned with PLVS VLTRA motto
Silver dollar of Ferdinand VII of Spain, 1821
Obverse
FERDIN[ANDUS] VII DEI GRATIA 1821"Ferdinand VII by the Grace of God, 1821." Right profile of Ferdinand VII with cloak and laurel wreath
Reverse
HISPAN[IARUM] ET IND[IARUM] REX M[EXICO] 8 R[EALES] I I"King of the Spains and the Indies, Mexico [City Mint], 8 reales." Crowned Spanish coat of arms between the Pillars of Hercules adorned with PLVS VLTRA motto

The Spanish dollar, also known as the piece of eight (Spanish: real de a ocho, dólar, peso duro, peso fuerte or peso), is a silver coin of approximately 38 mm (1.5 in) diameter worth eight Spanish reales. It was minted in the Spanish Empire following a monetary reform in 1497 with content 25.563 g (0.8219 ozt) fine silver. It was widely used as the first international currency because of its uniformity in standard and milling characteristics. Some countries countermarked the Spanish dollar so it could be used as their local currency.[1]

Because the Spanish dollar was widely used in Europe, the Americas, and the Far East, it became the first world currency by the 16th century.[2][3][4]

The Spanish dollar was the coin upon which the original United States dollar was based (at 0.7735 troy ounces or 24.06 grams), and it remained legal tender in the United States until the Coinage Act of 1857. Many other currencies around the world, such as the Japanese yen and the Chinese yuan, were initially based on the Spanish dollar and other 8-real coins.[5] Most theories trace the origin of the "$" symbol, which originally had two vertical bars, to the pillars of Hercules wrapped in ribbons that appear on the reverse side of the Spanish dollar.[6]

The term peso was used in Spanish to refer to this denomination, and it became the basis for many of the currencies in the former Spanish viceroyalties, including the Argentine, Bolivian, Chilean, Colombian, Costa Rican, Cuban, Dominican, Ecuadorian, Guatemalan, Honduran, Mexican, Nicaraguan, Paraguayan, Philippine, Puerto Rican, Peruvian, Salvadoran, Uruguayan, and Venezuelan pesos. Of these, "peso" remains the name of the official currency in the Philippines, Mexico, Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Colombia, Chile, Argentina, and Uruguay.

History

Etymology

In the 16th century, Count Hieronymus Schlick of Bohemia began minting a silver coin known as a Joachimsthaler, named after Joachimsthal, the valley in the Ore Mountains where the silver was mined.[7] Joachimsthaler was later shortened to thaler or taler, a word that eventually found its way into many European languages including the Spanish tálero and English as dollar.[7]

Europe and colonial North America

The Joachimsthaler weighed 451 Troy grains (29.2 g; 0.94 ozt) of silver. These coins' success led to similar thalers being minted in Burgundy and France and their ultimate succession by the long-lived Reichsthaler of the Holy Roman Empire, used from the 16th to 19th centuries, of 25.984 g (0.8354 ozt) pure silver.

The Netherlands also introduced its own dollars in the 16th century: the Burgundian Cross Thaler (Bourgondrische Kruisdaalder), the German-inspired Rijksdaalder, and the Dutch lion dollar (leeuwendaalder). The latter coin was used for Dutch trade in the Middle East, in the Dutch East Indies and West Indies, and in the Thirteen Colonies of North America.[8]

For the English North American colonists, however, the Spanish peso or "piece of eight" has always held first place, and this coin was also called the "dollar" as early as 1581. After the Declaration of American Independence, the United States dollar was introduced in 1792 at par with this coin at 371.25 grains = 0.7735 troy ounces = 24.0566 g. Alexander Hamilton arrived at these numbers based on a treasury assay of the average fine silver content of a selection of worn Spanish dollars.[9]

The term cob was used in Ireland and the British colonies to mean a piece of eight or a Spanish-American dollar, because Spanish gold and silver coins were irregularly shaped and crudely struck before the machine-milled dollar was introduced in 1732.

Spain

A silver Spanish dollar minted in Mexico City c. 1650

After the introduction of the Guldengroschen in Austria in 1486, the concept of a large silver coin with high purity (sometimes known as "specie" coinage) eventually spread throughout the rest of Europe. Monetary reform in Spain brought about the introduction of an 8-real (or 1-peso) coin in 1497, minted to the following standards-

  • In 1497: 8+38 dollars to a Castilian mark of silver (230.0465 grams), 134144 or 0.9306 fine (25.561 g fine silver = 0.8218 oz t)
  • In 1728: $8.50 to a mark, 1112 or 0.9167 fine (24.809 g fine silver = 0.7976 oz t)
  • In 1772: $8.50 to a mark, 130144 or 0.9028 fine (24.443 g fine silver = 0,78554 oz t); but true fineness 1772–1821 believed to be only 0.89.[10]

This was supplemented in 1537 by the gold escudo, minted at 68 to a mark of gold 0.917 fine (fineness reduced to 0.906 in 1742 and 0.875 in 1786). It was valued at 15–16 reales or approximately 2 dollars. The famed Gold Doubloon was worth 2 escudos or approximately 4 dollars.

From the 15th to the 19th centuries the coin was minted with several different designs at various mints in Spain and the New World, having gained wide acceptance beyond Spain's borders. Thanks to the vast silver deposits that were found mainly in Potosí in modern-day Bolivia and to a lesser extent in Mexico (for example, at Taxco and Zacatecas), and to silver from Spain's possessions throughout the Americas, mints in Mexico and Peru also began to strike the coin. The main New World mints for Spanish dollars were at Potosí, Lima, and Mexico City (with minor mints at Bogotá, Popayán, Guatemala City, and Santiago), and silver dollars from these mints could be distinguished from those minted in Spain by the Pillars of Hercules design on the reverse.

The dollar or peso was divided into 8 reales in Spanish Latin America until the 19th century when the peso was divided into 100 centavos. However, monetary turbulence in Spain beginning under the reign of King Philip II resulted in the dollar being subdivided as follows in Spain only:

  • Until 1642: $1 = 8 reales, subsequently called reales nacionales
  • From 1642: $1 = 10 reales provinciales
  • From 1687: $1 = 15+234 reales de vellón (made of billon alloy; edict not effective)
  • From 1737: $1 = 20 reales de vellón
  • In 1864: $1 = 2 silver escudos (different from the gold escudo)
  • And finally, in 1869: $1 = 5 Spanish pesetas, the latter at par with the French franc in the Latin Monetary Union.

Spain's adoption of the peseta in 1869 and its joining the Latin Monetary Union meant the effective end of the last vestiges of the Spanish dollar in Spain itself. However, the 5-peseta coin (or duro) was slightly smaller and lighter but was also of high purity (90%) silver.

In the 1990s, commemorative 2,000-peseta coins were minted, similar in size and weight to the dollar.

Mexico

Spanish Real de a Ocho coin (sometimes referred to as a "dollar") minted in Mexico City c. 1809

Following independence in 1821, Mexican coinage of silver reales and gold escudos followed that of Spanish lines until decimalization and the introduction of the peso worth 8 reales or 100 centavos. It continued to be minted to Spanish standards throughout the 19th century, with the peso at 27.07 grams (0.955 oz) of 0.9028 fine silver, and the escudo at 3.383 grams (0.1193 oz) of 0.875 fine gold. The Mexican peso or 8-real coin continued to be a popular international trading coin throughout the 19th century.

After 1918, the peso was reduced in size and fineness, with further reductions in the 1940s and 1950s. However, 2- (1921), 5- (1947) and 10-peso (1955) coins were minted during the same period with sizes and fineness similar to the old peso.

Australia

After the colony of New South Wales was founded in Australia in 1788, it ran into the problem of a lack of coinage, particularly since trading vessels took coins out of the colony in exchange for their cargo. In 1813, Governor Lachlan Macquarie made creative use of £10,000 in Spanish dollars sent by the British government. To make it difficult to take the coins out of the colony, and to double their number, the centres of the coins were punched out. The punched centre, known as the "dump", was valued at 15 pence, and the outer rim, known as the "holey dollar", was worth five shillings. This was indicated by overstamping the two new coins. The obverse of the holey dollar was stamped the words "New South Wales" and the date, 1813, and the reverse with the words "five shillings". The obverse of the dump was stamped with a crown, the words "New South Wales" and the date, 1813, and the reverse with the words "fifteen pence". The mutilated coins became the first official currency produced specifically for circulation in Australia.[11] The expedient was relatively short lived. The British Parliament passed the Sterling Silver Money Act in 1825, which made British coins the only recognised form of currency and ended any legitimate use of the holey dollar and dump in the Australian colonies.[12]

United States

The Coinage Act of 1792 created the United States Mint and initially defined the United States dollar at par with the Spanish dollar due to its international reputation:

By far the leading specie coin circulating in America was the Spanish silver dollar, defined as consisting of 387 grains of pure silver. The dollar was divided into "pieces of eight," or "bits," each consisting of one-eighth of a dollar. Spanish dollars came into the North American colonies through lucrative trade with the West Indies. The Spanish silver dollar had been the world's outstanding coin since the early 16th century, and was spread partially by dint of the vast silver output of the Spanish colonies in Latin America. More important, however, was that the Spanish dollar, from the 16th to the 19th century, was relatively the most stable and least debased coin in the Western world. [13]

The Coinage Act of 1792 specified that the U.S. dollar would contain 371.25 grains (24.057 g) pure or 416 grains (26.96 g) standard silver. This specification was based on the average weight of a random selection of worn Spanish dollars which Alexander Hamilton ordered to be weighed at the Treasury. Initially this dollar was comparable to the 371–373 grains found in circulating Spanish dollars and aided in its exportation overseas.[14] The restoration of the old 0.9028 fineness in the Mexican peso after 1821, however, increased the latter's silver content to 24.44 g and reduced the export demand for U.S. dollars.

Before the American Revolution, owing to British mercantilist policies, there was a chronic shortage of British currency in Britain's colonies. Trade was often conducted with Spanish dollars that had been obtained through illicit trade with the West Indies. Spanish coinage was legal tender in the United States until the Coinage Act of 1857 discontinued the practice. The pricing of equities on U.S. stock exchanges in 18-dollar denominations persisted until the New York Stock Exchange converted first to pricing in sixteenths of a dollar on 24 June 1997, and then in 2001 to decimal pricing.

Asia

1888 Mexican dollar with Chinese "chop" marks

Long tied to the lore of piracy, "pieces of eight" were manufactured in the Spanish Americas and transported in bulk back to Spain, making them a very tempting target for seagoing pirates. In the Far East, it also arrived in the form of the Philippine peso in the Philippines as part of the Spanish East Indies of the Spanish colonial empire through the Manila galleons that transported Mexican silver peso to Manila in the Manila-Acapulco Galleon Trade,[15][16] where it would be exchanged for Philippine and Chinese goods,[17][18] since silver was the only foreign commodity China would accept. In Oriental trade, Spanish dollars were often stamped with Chinese characters known as "chop marks" which indicated that particular coin had been assayed by a well-known merchant and determined to be genuine. The specifications of the Spanish dollar became a standard for trade in the Far East, with later Western powers issuing trade dollars, and colonial currencies such as the Hong Kong dollar, to the same specifications.

The first Chinese yuan coins had the same specification as a Spanish dollar, leading to a continuing equivalence in some respects between the names "yuan" and "dollar" in the Chinese language. Other currencies also derived from the dollar include the Japanese yen, Korean won, Philippine peso, Malaysian ringgit, French Indochinese piastre, etc. since it was widely traded across the Far East in the East Indies and the East Asia.[19]

Contemporary names used for Spanish dollars in Qing dynasty China include běnyáng (本洋), shuāngzhù (双柱), zhùyáng (柱洋), fóyáng (佛洋), fótóu (佛頭), fóyín (佛銀), and fótóuyín (佛頭銀). The "fó" element in those Chinese names referred to the King of Spain in those coins, as his face resembled that of images of the Buddha (佛 in Chinese); and the "zhù" part of those names referred to the two pillars in the Spanish coat of arms.

Spanish dollars countermarked in other countries

Fiction

In modern pop culture and fiction, pieces of eight are most often associated with the popular notion of pirates.

  • In Robert Louis Stevenson's Treasure Island, Long John Silver's parrot has learned to cry out "Pieces of eight!" This use tied the coin (and parrots) to fictional depictions of pirates. Deriving from the wide popularity of this book, "pieces of eight" is sometimes used to mean "money" or "a lot of money", regardless of specific denomination, and also as a synonym for treasure in general.
  • In the film Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End the Pirate Lords must meet together by presenting the "Nine Pieces of Eight", since these Pieces were used to seal the goddess Calypso in her human form by the first Brethren Court. The "ninth piece of eight" (Jack Sparrow's) hangs off his bandana in all films, up to its destruction in the third film.
  • Pieces of Eight is the eighth studio album and second concept album by Styx, released on 1 September 1978.
  • In Terry Pratchett's Going Postal, the antagonist Reacher Gilt (who physically resembles a stereotypical pirate) has a cockatoo named Alphonse which has been trained to say "Twelve and half percent!", that is to say a single piece of eight.[20]

See also

References

  1. ^ "Dissemination of Hispanic-American coinage". Encyclopædia Britannica. Archived from the original on 29 December 2011. Retrieved 7 February 2012.
  2. ^ Woodcock, Ray (1 May 2009). Globalization from Genesis to Geneva: A Confluence of Humanity. Trafford Publishing. pp. 104–105. ISBN 978-1-4251-8853-5. Archived from the original on 10 February 2024. Retrieved 13 August 2013.
  3. ^ Thomas J. Osborne (29 November 2012). Pacific Eldorado: A History of Greater California. John Wiley & Sons. p. 31. ISBN 978-1-118-29217-4. Archived from the original on 10 February 2024. Retrieved 13 August 2013.
  4. ^ Davies, Roy. "Origin and history of the world dollar and dollar sign". Archived from the original on 6 June 2023. Retrieved 29 January 2019.
  5. ^ Babones, Salvatore (30 April 2017). "'The Silver Way' Explains How the Old Mexican Dollar Changed the World". The National Interest. Archived from the original on 1 October 2023. Retrieved 15 April 2019.
  6. ^ Cordingly, David (1996). Under the Black Flag: The Romance and the Reality of Life Among the Pirates. Random House. p. 36. ISBN 9780679425601.
  7. ^ a b National Geographic. June 2002. p. 1. Ask Us.
  8. ^ "Lion Dollar - Introduction". coins.nd.edu. Archived from the original on 10 July 2018. Retrieved 29 May 2021.
  9. ^ Oxford English Dictionary, entry on "dollar", definition 2 ("The English name for the peso or piece of eight (i.e. eight reales), formerly current in Spain and the Spanish American colonies").
  10. ^ Sumner, W. G. (1898). "The Spanish dollar and the colonial shilling, pp 616-617: 24.038g fine / 27.07g = 0.89". The American Historical Review. 3 (4): 607–619. doi:10.2307/1834139. JSTOR 1834139.
  11. ^ "National Museum of Australia - Holey dollar". www.nma.gov.au. Archived from the original on 2 June 2021. Retrieved 29 May 2021.
  12. ^ "History: Fact Sheet 1" (PDF). Royal Australian Mint. Australian Government. Archived from the original (PDF) on 12 March 2011. Retrieved 16 December 2015.
  13. ^ Rothbard, Murray, Commodity Money in Colonial America Archived 18 June 2015 at the Wayback Machine, LewRockwell.com
  14. ^ Sumner, W. G. (1898). "The Spanish Dollar and the Colonial Shilling". The American Historical Review. 3 (4): 607–619. doi:10.2307/1834139. JSTOR 1834139.
  15. ^ Babones, Salvatore (30 April 2017). "'The Silver Way' Explains How the Old Mexican Dollar Changed the World". The National Interest. Archived from the original on 1 October 2023. Retrieved 15 April 2019.
  16. ^ "Report of the Philippine commission to the President, January 31, 1900, page 142-149, Part IX: The Currency". 1900. Archived from the original on 10 February 2024. Retrieved 9 November 2021.
  17. ^ Charles C. Mann (2011), 1493: Uncovering the New World Columbus Created, Random House Digital, pp. 123–163, ISBN 978-0-307-59672-7, archived from the original on 18 February 2023, retrieved 9 November 2021
  18. ^ Brook, Timothy (1998), The Confusions of Pleasure: Commerce and Culture in Ming China, Berkeley: University of California Press, p. 205, ISBN 0-520-21091-3, archived from the original on 18 February 2023, retrieved 9 November 2021
  19. ^ "Chinese Guides for identifying Silver Dollars and Other Coins, 19th Century". 16 February 2018. Archived from the original on 21 March 2019. Retrieved 7 February 2019.
  20. ^ Pratchett, Terry (2004). Going Postal. Doubleday. ISBN 0-385-60342-8.

Further reading

8 Annotations

First Reading

Pedro  •  Link

Pieces of Eight…Morgan’s raid on Portobelo.

(Summary from Pope’s Biography of Morgan)

When Morgan returned to Jamaica he brought 250,000 pieces of eight and other merchandise. Pieces of eight were legal currency in Jamaica and valued at 5 shillings.

Each seaman received £60 and the King’s share was £600. (The King’s share was kept to repair the fortifications at Port Royal).

250,000 equalled £62,500, and because of the changes in value since 1668, to understand the value it is best to compare other values and costs.

It compares favourably with the value of London’s entire export to “all” the Plantations being £107,000.

Three times the customs paid in 1676-7 by Barbados, Nevis, Antigua, Montserrat, St.Kitts and Anguilla being £20,700.

It was almost exactly a tenth of the year's exports from the Plantations to England being £605,000.

TerryF  •  Link

The origin of the name

"The peso had a nominal value of eight reales ("royals"). The coins were often physically cut into eight 'bits,' or sometimes four quarters, to make smaller change. This is the origin of the colloquial name 'pieces of eight' for the coin, and of 'quarter' and 'two bits' for twenty-five cents in the United States." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piec…

dirk  •  Link

On the exchange rate problem with reference to the "pieces of eight" -- and why the lower exchange rate should be preferred -- see the diary entry for 11 May 1663, and annotations:

http://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/1…

michael brindamour  •  Link

It's true that sometimes the eight reale coin was sometimes broken up, and weight determined the value of the piece,however they were also minted and in some cases hand pounded (cobs)into coins of a specifis denomination I.E 1/2 reale 1 reale,2 reale,4 reale etc. Coins that were produced in places where there was'nt a mint, were hand made by certified representitives of the King and had a stamp of the kings coinage coat of arms,these were made under strict government control and anyone caught trying to counterfeit these coins was beheaded!

Second Reading

Bill  •  Link

A Table of Coins, Gold, Silver and Brass ...
Royals of Eight. 4(s).5(d)
---A Large Dictionary. T. Holyoke, 1677.

(This was a silver coin, BTW)

Third Reading

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

"The ocean is a lonely, perilous place. It is especially so when you are aboard a leak-prone wooden vessel laden with a rich cargo of sugar, silks, and opium, ... " So starts a New Yorker article on pirates told me about the English 17th century need for Pieces of Eight, and other things piratical:

Privateers often relied on letters of marque that were invalid, expired, or issued after the fact, when they had letters at all. For the most part, the authorities didn’t mind. So long as the pirates had their prows pointed in the right direction, their work was good for business. Not only did they harry England’s rivals; they also enriched its colonies.

McDonald notes their importance in furnishing new settlements with enslaved people, who were initially hard for English colonists to buy through normal trade. The Africans sold into bondage in Virginia in 1619 (the event that prompted the 1619 Project) had been seized from a Portuguese slave ship by an English privateer carrying a Dutch letter of marque.

Pirates also supplied cash. The Americas produced prodigious amounts of silver and gold, but the mines were in the Spanish and Portuguese colonies. The English colonies suffered chronic shortages of the metal they needed to pay England’s taxes and buy its goods.

One turn-of-the-18th-century observer estimated that the average coin lasted only 6 months in America before leaving for England.

Since imperial rules and rivalries blocked English colonists from trading directly with their Spanish and Portuguese counterparts, pirates and smugglers (overlapping categories) were indispensable. They tapped the rich vein of minerals flowing from the Americas to Iberia, irrigating the English empire with hard currency.

“Pieces of eight” and “doubloons” sound like colorful pirate talk, but they were the English names for Spanish coins, which the pirates stole in their raids, earned from their trade, and spent on their sprees. These, plus gold coins from Indian Ocean plunder, flooded colonial societies.

The familiar dollar sign was originally the American symbol for the peso, the fabled “piece of eight.”
In cash-parched America, illicitly acquired Spanish silver was the predominant currency, so it became the sign for money.

Pirate sexuality is relevant here, because sex was a crucial conduit through which foreign coin entered the colonies. The ports that pirates favored were hotbeds of prostitution. This was illegal, and in the pirate haunt of Port Royal, in Jamaica, “common strumpetts” were jailed in a “cage by the turtle market,” a visitor wrote.
But, rather than locking these women in the wench kennel, Jamaica should have erected statues to them for resolving the colonial liquidity crisis. The largest statue should be of the unnamed woman who talked a pirate into giving her 500 pieces of eight just to watch her strip.
Forget Blackbeard; she’s the outlaw they should be making television shows about.

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

CONCLUSION:

The ports also brimmed with silversmiths.

We think of silversmithing as a classic “ye olde” profession; Paul Revere was a silversmith, and they outnumbered lawyers in Colonial America. But why were any there at all, given that the land had little by way of silver mines?

The answer, Mark Hanna explains, is that silversmiths worked as fences, transmuting “pirate metal” into respectable wealth. The first mint in the 13 colonies was established in 1652 by John Hull, who made Massachusetts pine-tree shillings from Spanish bullion. Hull was a silversmith; his brother Edward was a pirate.

John Hull faced charges for backing his brother’s pirate ship, but he was acquitted. Such outcomes were common. Although piracy was a felony, it could also be a bonanza, and sympathetic locals made prosecution difficult.

Moses Butterworth, who had sailed with Capt. William Kidd, was tried for piracy in what’s now New Jersey, an armed militia stormed the courthouse. The judge drew his sword, but he was no match for more than 100 men with guns and clubs. They freed Butterworth and seized the governor and the sheriff, taking them prisoner. They held the governor for 4 days, by which point Butterworth was long gone. (He turned up 3 years later in Newport, Rhode Island, captaining his own vessel.)

Richard Blakemore’s new book, “Enemies of All,” addresses this theme. In Pennsylvania, Blakemore notes, a prominent pirate married the governor’s daughter and was elected to the legislature.

An even more prominent pirate, Henry Morgan was arrested and hauled to London. Then, after being released without punishment, he was knighted and returned to Jamaica, where he served several stints as the acting governor. When Morgan died, in 1688, he received a state funeral in Port Royal, with a 22-gun salute. Pirates were reportedly given amnesty to join the mourners.

Much more at
https://www.newyorker.com/magazin…

Log in to post an annotation.

If you don't have an account, then register here.

References

Chart showing the number of references in each month of the diary’s entries.

1663

1664

1667

1668