The 1819 Chilean Portales Pattern Peso
Boosibri
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The 1819 Chilean Portales Pattern Peso
At the August 2025 ANA sale, the Eternal Collection was sold and within it contained the finest documented 1819 Chilean Pattern Peso, often called the Portales Peso, named after mint super intendent Jose Santiago Portales. I underbid this coin, being caught off guard by the price it achieved and immediately regretted the decision not to chase further. For the set which I am building it is an essential coin and with five known, a very rare opportunity.
A collector friend happened to know the person who bought the coin from the sale. I made an offer and was able to purchase the coin, taking delivery at the CSNS show. Thank you to both @Scubafuel and the collector for helping me to add this coin.
In 1817, the newly independent Chile adopted the iconic Volcano design for its new coinage. Immediately after issuance, the design was aesthetically criticized and often counterfeited. The mint super intendent J.S. Portales struck a proposed replacement with the Volcano and Globe icons featured on the circulating coinage, with a significant more elaborate design and elaborate lattice border. The design was never adopted, perhaps due to the impracticality of the elaborate design and complexity of engraving given the simple technical resources available to the mint at the time. The simpler (and still beautiful) Volcano peso design in circulation remained unchanged until 1834.
The Portales Family
The Portales family had deep roots in the numismatic operations of Chile. J.S Portales was the second in his family to hold the title of Mint Superintendent. His father, Diego Portales also served as Superintendent until 1799 when J.S. Portales took over the role, holding it until at least 1826 when he was sworn into the National Congress as Superintendent. The son of J.S Portales, also named Diego, was an assayer at the mint from 1817 to 1821, adding the “D” to the “FD” during the period.
Census
Today, there are five examples of the Portales pattern documented. The Leonardos coin (1929 J. Schulman auction) shown below is either an image of another documented example, or a sixth coin. Carlos Jara suggests that the coin is the same as the Santiago coin sold by Christensen in 1986. Given the near 60 year gap in images, it is very possible.
Comments
Nice research and write up.
Somebody told me (perhaps Heritage, who auctioned it) that coin #2 had been buried. In fact I believe in its first auction appearance (where Tarapaca bought it), it was raw.
Well done! That's a big boy coin
I'm BACK!!! Used to be Billet7 on the old forum.
Congratulations.
For coin #2:
First appearance (HA Sep 2009 Long Beach auction) $13,800 where Tarapaca bought it. Sold raw.
https://coins.ha.com/itm/chile/chile-republic-pattern-peso-1819-santiago-/a/3006-20492.s
Second appearance (HA Sep 2011 Long Beach auction) $13,800 where Tarapaca sold it. It was now slabbed XF45.
https://coins.ha.com/itm/chile/chile-republic-silver-pattern-peso-1819-/a/3015-23830.s
First of all, congrats @Boosibri! Great to see that you landed this coin in your collection. Way to make it happen. Great to see that a board member worked to help you out.
“The design was aesthetically criticized…”
I kind of like the obverse volcano design to be honest. A condor would’ve been great on the reverse but I don’t think the overall design is anything to complain about personally.
I agree, it is in my top 3 along with the CAR mountains and sun, Argentina Sunface.
Latin American Collection
Staring at the pictures again of the Leonardo’s coin, the inner ring on the globe side appears incomplete in the “FU” of Fuerza. This feature is not present on any of the other coins. It would seem to suggest to me that it is in fact a sixth example.
Latin American Collection