Mining in Colonial Ecuador
Kris E. Lane, Wakefield Distinguished Professor of History, William & Mary College

Chapter 3, "Production and Flows of Precious Metals in the Audiencia of Quito," from Mining the Margins: Precious Metal Extraction and Forced Labor Regimes in the Audienca of Quito, 1534-1821, Volume 1 (PhD, University of Minnesota, 1996). Click here.

Gold Production, Colonial Quito

Stories

By Vic Sceare from a collection, Gathering Up , still being worked on.
Click Hex.
Click Is It Over?
Click Gym Misfortunes.
Click A Book Is A Shelf or Not.
Click On Track, Off Track.

To Rule Oneself in Antebellum American
Richard L. Garner

Access to a Working Paper on "TO RULE ONESELF: Concept of Self-Government and the Rise of Individualism in Pre-Civil-War America". A pdf file of about 240 pages with footnotes. All rights reserved to the author.

This manuscript concerns the idea of who should rule in America after the Revolutionary War and before the Civil War. It makes the argument that America elaborated a political ideology built upon the assumption that individuals could and should govern themselves mostly. A society of individuals governing themselves led Alexis de Tocqueville to invent the word individualisme to distinguish what he found in American from what he knew in France and Europe where ideas of individuals being ruled were widely practiced and embraced. As the conflict over slavery intensified, a nation of self–governing may have lacked a political mechanism by which to reach a collective resolution. Individualism then as now had some unintended consequences.

The downloadable file has reached 1840. I am currently writing the fifth and final part that will conclude with the election of Abraham Lincoln and the secession of the South. Please be aware that the file as it now appears is subject to revision at a later date. In the Header of the file I have indicated the date that the file was uploaded. The file is approximately 1.5 megabytes.

RunAway and Who Knows?

Two of three novellas by S-A R Soms, reprinted with permission.

Click here for Run Away

Click here for Who Knows?

Bullion Outflows, Spanish America to Far East
Richard L. Garner

"Where Did All the Silver Go? Bullion Outflows 1570-1650: A Review of the Numbers and the Absence of Numbers"

Between discovery and independence Latin American produced around 150,000 tons of gold and silver. That was far more than could ever be spent in the New World. Between 80 and 90 percent of the mineral output was exported. Most of it was exported to Europe and from there to various places including the Far East. Direct trade between the Far East (through the Philippines) and Spanish America began in the middle of the 16th Century, and grew as the output of the mines in Zacatecas (Mexico), Potosí (Bolivia) and other camps increased during the second half of the 16th Century and the first half of the 17th Century. Recently some scholars have ramped up the bullion outflows in response to heavy demand for silver, mainly in China, and also to strong demand for Oriental goods in the Spanish colonies. The official recorded outflows, they have argued, were flawed statistics because of a robust contraband trade that existed along side of the mandated fleet trade. In this essay I examine the statistical and non-statistical sources to try to determine how much validity should be assigned to the much elevated recent estimates. I have used the official records to create a baseline from the Philippines to the Spanish colonies and of bullion from Acapulco to Manila within the context of a cyclical mining sector and a vacillating royal policy. I have assembled and analyzed some new datasets based on the research of Engel Sluiter, John TePaske, etc., and I have tried to weigh these results against the projections of merchandise imports and bullion exports by Dennis Flynn. Although the portrait remains unfinished, it appears to have an ebb and flow that is somewhat different from past as well as current estimates.

For the essay, click here.

For the actual datasets, go to www.historydatadesk.com and click on Pubs.

Photographs of 17th Gold and Silver Coins from Spanish America