Bolivia 1727-P Y 2 reales
This specimen was lot 647 in Sedwick Treasure Auction 27 (Winter Park, FL, May 2020), where it sold for $285.60. The catalog description[1] noted, "Potosí, Bolivia, cob 2 reales, 1727Y, Louis I. Oblong flan with good full cross, one 100%-full pillar, two dates, LVI(S) visible (rare thus), AVF with deeply toned fields." The Potosí mint was the most prolific issuer of silver during the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, nearly all of it cobs such as this. This type was struck 1725-27 and was superseded by a later type (KM 29a) which was 0.917 fine silver. The other Latin American mints placed the date near the edge where it rarely struck up, whereas Potosi issues have the date smack in the middle, ensuring that the date would be legible even if the rest of the design was smeared. As a result, Bolivian cobs can be collected by date, unlike the other mints (Mexico, Lima, Guatemala). The Potosí mint was the last to abandon the manufacture of cobs, in 1773.
Recorded mintage: unknown.
Specification: 6.77 grams, 0.917 fine silver, this specimen 6.49 grams.
Catalog reference: Cayón-8782, S-P43b; KM-34; Cal-27.
- Michael, Thomas, Standard Catalog of World Coins, 1701-1800, 7th ed., Iola, WI: Krause Publications, 2016.
- Cayón, Adolfo, Clemente Cayón and Juan Cayón, Las Monedas Españolas, del Tremis al Euro: del 411 a Nuestros Dias, 2 volumes, Madrid: Cayón-Jano S.L., 2005.
- Calicó, Xavier, Numismática Española: Catálogo General con Precios de Todas las Monedas Españolas Acuñadas desde Los Reyes Católicos Hasta Felipe VI, 1474 a 2020, Barcelona: Aureo & Calicó, 2019.
- Menzel, Sewall, Cobs, Pieces of Eight and Treasure Coins, New York: The American Numismatic Society, 2004.
- [1]Sedwick, Daniel Frank, Augi Garcia and Cori Sedwick Downing, Treasure Auction 27, Winter Park, FL: Daniel Frank Sedwick LLC, 2020.
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