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Updated: June 13, 2025
The better to demonstrate their desire for peace, the natives made them beautiful presents, consisting of a quantity of gold, equal in weight to three thousand of the kind of coins we have said are called castellanos, and in vulgar language pesos; also a wooden tub full of precious incense, weighing about twenty-six hundred pounds, at eight ounces to the pound.
In the reign of Ferdinand and Isabella the mark of silver, which was equal to 8 ounces or to 50 castellanos, was divided into 65 reals, and each real into 34 maravedis; so that there were 2210 maravedis in the mark of silver. Among other silver coins there was the real of 8, which consisting of 8 reals, was, within a small fraction, the eighth part of a mark of silver, or one ounce.
Pizarro, with his usual policy, sent back to Panama a large quantity of the gold, no less than twenty thousand castellanos in value, in the belief that the sight of so much treasure, thus speedily acquired, would settle the doubt of the wavering, and decide them on joining his banner.19 He judged right.
"On that day I learned that there were eighty leagues of land with mines at every point thereof. The opinion now is that it is all one. Some have collected a hundred and twenty castellanos in one day, and others ninety, and even the number of two hundred and fifty has been reached.
He had one piece that weighed, they said, five thousand castellanos. Roldan too had gold. And the Governor was sending no man knew how much. More than that He looked at us, then, being a kindly soul, quoth, "Why shouldn't the Admiral know? Alonso de Carvajal has put on board the Santa Clara for the Admiral's agent in Cadiz five thousand pieces fully due, as the Governor had allowed."
But on February 12, 1542, the crown officers, including Castellanos, reported that the emperor's order to suspend work on the fort of San German had been obeyed. In February, 1543, the bishop wrote to the emperor: "The people of San German, for fear of the French privateers, have taken their families and property into the woods.
The weight of each castellano, a Castilian coin, is called a peso, and the entire sum, therefore, amounted to fifteen thousand castellanos. The castellano is a coin somewhat inferior to one thirtieth of a pound, but its value exceeds that of a golden ducat. This coin is peculiar to Castile, and is not minted in any other province.
He will have to spend some of it, but he will give you what he has remaining. He also carries a letter of credit for these merchants. You will see that it is very necessary to be careful in dealing with them, because I had trouble there with the Governor, as every one told me that I had there 11,000 or 12,000 castellanos, and I had only 4000.
From thence the chief of the expedition sent back one of his ships to Cortès, while the rest proceeded northwards, but from that time nothing more is heard of them. Such was the unhappy result of the expeditions of Cortès, which, while they did not bring him in a single ducat, cost him not less than 300,000 gold castellanos.
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