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Description
This is a 2 Reales coin from Spain dated 1708, and inscribed with the name “Carlos III”, despite the fact King Carlos III would not even be born for another 8 years. That’s because this Carlos is a different man, A Habsburg Archduke who, three years after this coin was minted, became Holy Roman Emperor Karl VI. When Charles II, the genetic disaster that was king of Spain from 1665-1700 (how he managed to even live that long, we may never know) died without an heir, Archduke Karl claimed it for himself, despite Captain Inbreeding bequeathing the kingdom to the grandson of the Sun King, who would become Felipe V. This triggered the War of the Spanish Succession, and Karl, with support from Portugal, Prussia, England, Scotland, Savoy, and the Dutch Republic, set out for Spain in 1705, but was never able to extend his control further than Catalonia, where this coin was made. Karl left Spain in 1711 to take the Imperial crown in Vienna, but the war went on for another couple of years, until 1713, when the Treaties of Utrecht and Rastatt brought the war to and end, with Karl abandoning his claim for the Spanish throne in exchange for Felipe renouncing his right to the French throne and ceding Spain’s Italian and Belgian possessions to Austria.

This coin was minted in those few brief years when the Austrian pretender contested the Spanish throne out of Catalonia.

Description
This is a 2 Reales coin from Spain dated 1708, and inscribed with the name “Carlos III”, despite the fact King Carlos III would not even be born for another 8 years. That’s because this Carlos is a different man, A Habsburg Archduke who, three years after this coin was minted, became Holy Roman Emperor Karl VI. When Charles II, the genetic disaster that was king of Spain from 1665-1700 (how he managed to even live that long, we may never know) died without an heir, Archduke Karl claimed it for himself, despite Captain Inbreeding bequeathing the kingdom to the grandson of the Sun King, who would become Felipe V. This triggered the War of the Spanish Succession, and Karl, with support from Portugal, Prussia, England, Scotland, Savoy, and the Dutch Republic, set out for Spain in 1705, but was never able to extend his control further than Catalonia, where this coin was made. Karl left Spain in 1711 to take the Imperial crown in Vienna, but the war went on for another couple of years, until 1713, when the Treaties of Utrecht and Rastatt brought the war to and end, with Karl abandoning his claim for the Spanish throne in exchange for Felipe renouncing his right to the French throne and ceding Spain’s Italian and Belgian possessions to Austria.

This coin was minted in those few brief years when the Austrian pretender contested the Spanish throne out of Catalonia.