Apologies for cross-posting. ("...the friars couldn't touch coins.. Huh???)
 
>Date: Mon, 08 Mar 1999 17:28:15 -0700
>From: dogyears <[log in to unmask]>
>Subject: Got CALICHE ?
>
>Got CALICHE ?  http://www.swanet.org/caliche.html
>
>SPANISH COIN GIVES CLUE TO STATE'S PAST 03/01/99 01:29PM ST. SIMONS ISLAND,
>Ga. (AP) _ Robertson Shinnick has found a tiny piece of Georgia's past _
>lost for more than 300 years. Searching the ground on this resort isle with
>a metal detector last fall, the 33-year-old coin collector dug a foot into
>the black soil and found an odd-shaped coin. "I had in my hand a small,
>squarish piece of copper with a strange design on it," Shinnick said. "I
>knew the Spanish colonial mints struck millions of silver coins, but this
>was obviously copper. "It was a mystery until I identified the design as
>the monogram of Philip IV of Spain, who reigned from 1621 to 1665." Turns
>out the four-maraved coin, a low-value sort of penny of its era, had been
>hand-forged in Spain about 1658. It isn't particularly dear to collectors _
>it's worth about $65 _ but it's valuable to Georgia historians. John Worth,
>director of programs for the Calhoun-based Coosawattee Foundation and one
>of the top experts on 17th century Spanish missions along the Georgia
>coast, calls the coin "quite a find." He says Shinnick's coin gives a clue
>about the long-lost mission of Santo Domingo de Asajo, built in 1595 to
>convert Native Americans to Christianity. It was destroyed by
>English-backed slave traders in 1661, rebuilt a year later, then burned by
>British pirates in 1684. "There were about 30 men, women and children, and
>friars, but  no soldiers. A small garrison of soldiers was located on
>nearby St. Catherine's Island," Worth says. Other traces of the early
>Spanish period, such as olive jars and pottery shards, have been found on
>St. Simons, says Worth, who's done extensive studies on the island. But
>coins such as the one Shinnick found are rare along the Georgia coast.
>Shinnick's may be the first found on St. Simons. "Its significance is in
>our common state heritage," Worth says. "It is a bit of actual, concrete
>evidence of the Spanish missions, right here in Georgia." Shinnick, a
>bellman at the King and Prince Resort, found the coin on private land at
>Hampton Point, where million-dollar mansions are being built. One side of
>the time-blackened coin shows the royal monogram of Philip IV and a Roman
>numeral for the denomination. The other shows the letters "RX" _ for "rex,"
>or "king," according to Worth. "Because the friars couldn't touch coins, my
>best guess is it was dropped by a passing soldier or an Indian," says
>Worth, whose Coosawattee Foundation aims to protect former Native American
>sites in the Southeast. "It's just a good history lesson from an era that's
>been lost."
>
 
Anita Cohen-Williams
Research Analyst, Donor Relations, USD
Listowner of HISTARCH, SUB-ARCH, SPANBORD
Contributing Editor, Anthropology page, http://www.suite101.com
http://www.angelfire.com/ca/cohwill/index.html
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