American Apparel Circle Instructions

The value of a penny

How much is a penny the time of Cervantes (XVI and XVII centuries)?



order to study this interesting subject, we can refer to the population census of the provinces and the Crown of Castile in the sixteenth century published by Thomas Publishing MAXTOR Gonzalez in 1829. Google Books digitized part of the work , including the interesting Appendix II (p. 94), which reads as follows:

POINTING THE POPULATION OF THE CROWN OF CASTILE IN THE YEAR 1482

Alonso de Quintanilla, Chief accountant of Lords Catholic Monarchs sent
their Highnesses in 1482 following the alignment:

"Your Highnesses commanded me that I should think as
could shape people regno toviesen this your weapons generally, and non were
as unarmed people as they are. As I have long thought, and humbly
talking to your Highnesses, methinks that could shape the
agora toviesen board that the following weapons:
That in the é cibdades villas, Crown and Abadengo é Logan and
orders, and Behetrías, as they do in the provinces, which send
than five thousand coppers toviese finance, is tenudo take home a
shield, a lance é, é a sword, and a cap.
Item: toviese than ten thousand coppers of fasienda be tenudo of
take home a shield, é some armor, a lance é, é a sword, or a
armor, a helmet é, é a sword, and a dagger, dart é é a crossbow steel
three pounds, and a quiver of bolts.
Item: which of these people of ten thousand coppers, dende é above
have these weapons that I have: and those which may come to twenty thousand pieces of silver to finance
in Logar of the spring steel, with a shotgun, one hundred and fifty é
balls, and twenty pounds of gunpowder. "

interesting thing about this text, and his undeniable poetic value, is that we can have an approximation of the cost of living at that time, a hundred years before the parución of Don Quixote. A person with a farm (we could say, capital) of 5,000 was maravedís class person "medium low", which was to ensure their safety with minimal equipment (a shield, a spear, a sword and a helmet) while a person with a farm of 20,000 coppers up, class "medium high", should also have these (and more) basic equipment, a shotgun, terrible firearm capable of scaring even the most ferocious enemies.

To move this to our time, we have to set capital levels for deciding that a person is a lower middle class or upper middle class.

To find the levels of capital, I think the safest thing is to look at the housing market. Let's stay in Spain. How much is a lower middle-class apartment in Madrid? I think we can risk with 120,000 euro, taking a quick look at the site fotocasa.es . Preserving the factor 4 Alonso de Quintanilla, this would give us an upper middle-class home for some 480,000 euro. It seems reasonable.

This gives us an exchange rate of 1 penny for 24 euro.

And the shotgun?

Well, in conclusion, if you live in a house up to 480,000 euro (about 340 million Chilean pesos) will definitely get you have to think about this .

New elements

After several days of intense search, our financial research department found valuable information on the Virtual Center Cervantes:

In 1605, in New Castile, a dozen eggs cost about 63 coppers, and a oranges, 54, a chicken, 55, and a hen, 127, half a kilo of mutton, about 28, a ream of writing paper, 28.

This information allows us to find a conversion table:

article ; Rate Euros maravedis
63 2 Dozen eggs, 7 0.04

54 5 dozen oranges 0.09

A chicken 55 , 7
0.13 127 A Chicken ; 9 0.07
pound of Carnero May 28 0.18
Ream Paper February 28 0.07

Note: The author took the liberty to replace half a kilo of mutton and half a kilo of a poor cut of beef ... If any of you know where to get mutton, please pass the data.

Now, we know by averaging the basket fairly representative, in fact, a penny from 1615 is worth about 10 cents of euro (or about 72 Chilean pesos) in 2010. .. But then? What about the finances of 5,000 coppers? You could have a modest estate with 500 euros (about 360 luquitas)? Gwaw. Geez that has increased the price of land.

Another fact of equal importance: have set as the eggs have been devalued? Lost more than 50% in 400 years! Awesome, the industrialization of agriculture.