S5E203 - The Royal Fifth: Gold, Silver, and the Crown's Cut

In 1504, Ferdinand and Isabella decreed that the Crown would take one fifth of all treasure from the New World. This episode traces the quinto real from its origins in the Reconquista to its role in funding the Spanish Empire — and in shaping the conquest itself. We meet the officials who enforced it, from the Casa de Contratación in Seville to the assayers in Mexico City, and see how the quinto became a point of negotiation, conflict, and even corruption. Through the eyes of Bernal Díaz del Castillo and the Florentine Codex, we look at how the Spanish obse...