silver and gold plate/ingots

[Professor Death]

ok, we got our little pyratin' gig coming up next year and i been thinking about a few things we could do to add to the scenario, and one thing i thought up was things on the boarded ship to loot. i have a SMALL collection of repro period coins, but i figured we probably should show them taking the "non-treasure" things, like textiles, food, a keg, all the arms and ammunition, sails, rope, etc., etc. however, i know well the public's obsession over "pirate treasure" and thought it might be interesting to make some fake ingots of gold or silver. i have a can of silver paint from making wooden safety weapons, so i thought about using that to paint some 2"X2" boards to look like silver bars. heres my question: what size were those bars coming out of the spanish mines and ports? i've handled modern precious metal ingots, and i can well imagine how heavy they might have been. since the reals were supposedly struck from those bars, i reckoned that a 2X2 is about the right size. maybe i'm off here. then HOW LONG would they be? again, they were being hauled out by mules and slaves, so they couldn't be THAT huge, right? i've never seen any period silver or gold bars in person, or read any dimensional descriptions, which is why i ask. i'd like the "props" to be as right as possible, even if it is just wood. plus we won't have to go diving if they fall in the water, like if they were made out of brass or aluminum from the scrap bin at work.....

[William Brand]

Spanish silver and gold was shipped in a variety of sizes and shapes, so there is no real right or wrong when making prop bars and ingots. I've seen bars that were three or four inches thick and a foot and a half long, so you could get crazy with the gold. I would suggest that you have a fine mix of large bars and smaller ingots and here is a page for good ingots images and dimensions...

http://www.coins.nd.edu/ColCoin/ColCoinText/Sp-Gold.1.html

[Cascabel]

ok, we got our little pyratin' gig coming up next year and i been thinking about a few things we could do to add to the scenario, and one thing i thought up was things on the boarded ship to loot. i have a SMALL collection of repro period coins, but i figured we probably should show them taking the "non-treasure" things, like textiles, food, a keg, all the arms and ammunition, sails, rope, etc., etc. however, i know well the public's obsession over "pirate treasure" and thought it might be interesting to make some fake ingots of gold or silver. i have a can of silver paint from making wooden safety weapons, so i thought about using that to paint some 2"X2" boards to look like silver bars. heres my question: what size were those bars coming out of the spanish mines and ports? i've handled modern precious metal ingots, and i can well imagine how heavy they might have been. since the reals were supposedly struck from those bars, i reckoned that a 2X2 is about the right size. maybe i'm off here. then HOW LONG would they be? again, they were being hauled out by mules and slaves, so they couldn't be THAT huge, right? i've never seen any period silver or gold bars in person, or read any dimensional descriptions, which is why i ask. i'd like the "props" to be as right as possible, even if it is just wood. plus we won't have to go diving if they fall in the water, like if they were made out of brass or aluminum from the scrap bin at work.....

The Spanish silver ingots recovered from the wreck of the Atocha that are in the Mell Fisher Museum in Key West are about the size and shape of loaves of Italian bread, and about 80 pounds each. They have various assay stampings on them on the flat side. They are the color of lead, rather than being shiney, from long immersion in the sea. I suspect they were fairly shiney when new.

>>>> Cascabel

[MarkG]

ok, we got our little pyratin' gig coming up next year and i been thinking about a few things we could do to add to the scenario, and one thing i thought up was things on the boarded ship to loot. i have a SMALL collection of repro period coins, but i figured we probably should show them taking the "non-treasure" things, like textiles, food, a keg, all the arms and ammunition, sails, rope, etc., etc. however, i know well the public's obsession over "pirate treasure" and thought it might be interesting to make some fake ingots of gold or silver. i have a can of silver paint from making wooden safety weapons, so i thought about using that to paint some 2"X2" boards to look like silver bars. heres my question: what size were those bars coming out of the spanish mines and ports? i've handled modern precious metal ingots, and i can well imagine how heavy they might have been. since the reals were supposedly struck from those bars, i reckoned that a 2X2 is about the right size. maybe i'm off here. then HOW LONG would they be? again, they were being hauled out by mules and slaves, so they couldn't be THAT huge, right? i've never seen any period silver or gold bars in person, or read any dimensional descriptions, which is why i ask. i'd like the "props" to be as right as possible, even if it is just wood. plus we won't have to go diving if they fall in the water, like if they were made out of brass or aluminum from the scrap bin at work.....

The Spanish silver ingots recovered from the wreck of the Atocha that are in the Mell Fisher Museum in Key West are about the size and shape of loaves of Italian bread, and about 80 pounds each. They have various assay stampings on them on the flat side. They are the color of lead, rather than being shiney, from long immersion in the sea. I suspect they were fairly shiney when new.

>>>> Cascabel

See here for a picture. The bars were rough cast, probably into a depression in sand giving them that bread loaf shape. Then they were weighed. If they were too heavy then a piece was cut off with a chisel. Finally, they were stamped with a royal seal to indicate that they had been weighed.

I heard a talk by one of the divers. He was disappointed by the "treasure chests." The chests used in the Atocha were just planks nailed together with the minimum number of nails to hold it together.

Mark