This coin was recovered from the "Rimac" river in Lima, Peru. The river was the transportation from the silver mines in the New World to the ocean where they were then loaded onto the treasure galleons to be sent back to the Old World.  For a period of several hundred years, residents and sailors would toss in a coin for safe passage or good fortune. Over the centuries, the mud banks of the river have captured and preserved thousands of Spanish silver coins. 

This type of coin is unique in its shape and striking, therefore no two of these coins will ever be exactly the same . Yet, amazingly, for each denomination, the weight is almost exactly the same. They were hand-made, mostly by the indigenous Indians of the New World, cut from the end of a refined silver bar, then clipped, heated, and hand struck between two crudely made engraved dies. They were then filed to the exact requisite weight of silver, according to the denomination.  They made them in denominations of 1/2, 1, 2, 4, and 8 Reales and they were called "Pieces of Eight" or Cob coins (meaning end of the bar). Depending on the mint and the era, the obverse bears the Coat of Arms of the reigning Spanish King or the Pillars of Hercules over the waves of the sea with the Latin warning: PLUS ULTRA meaning, "Spain owns all that is beyond the oceans". The reverse usually has, in varying styles, a Jerusalem cross.