Potosi: The Silver Mine that Changed the World
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摘要
Spanish colonial rule in the Americas was a brutal regime that killed millions of native Americans and transferred a nearly unimaginable volume of wealth from the New World to the Old World. Awful though it was, the Spanish efforts in the Americas would profoundly change not just the Americas but also the entire world. Rarely remembered today, Potosí and its mountain - Cerro Rico, literally “Rich Mountain” - would play a pivotal role in history.
This is original content based on research by The History Guy. Images in the Public Domain are carefully selected and provide illustration. As very few images of the actual event are available in the Public Domain, images of similar objects and events are used for illustration.
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中英文字稿 
西班牙对美洲的殖民统治是一个残暴的政权，导致数百万美洲原住民的死亡，并将新大陆几乎不可想象的财富转移到旧大陆。这些财富不仅改变了美洲，也最终改变了整个世界及其经济体系。这不仅仅是旧大陆与新大陆的联系，还推动了东西方、南北方之间的联系，彻底重塑了世界。或许，没有哪个地方比今天几乎被遗忘的高山小镇波托西更能代表这些变化的本质。波托西及其被称为“哈罗里科”（意思是“富饶的山脉”）的山峰在世界历史中占据惊人的重要地位。这段历史值得被铭记。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
Spanish colonial rule in the Americas was a brutal regime that killed millions of Native Americans and transferred an almost unimaginable amount of wealth from the new world to the old. And that wealth would not just transform the Americas, it would end up transforming the world, its entire economies. It wasn't just a connection between the old world and the new, it drove connections between east and west, north and south. It remade the world. And perhaps no single spot is more representative of the nature of all these changes than the high mountain town of Potosi, barely remembered today Potosi and its mountain called Haro Rico, literally rich mountain, or surprisingly central to the history of the world. It is history that deserves to be remembered.
在1544或1545年，一位名叫迭戈·德·瓦尔帕的卡卡人（Caecha）意外地在塞罗里科山（Cerro Rico）发现了银矿。据说当时他正在寻找一座卡卡神庙，可能还为一位在附近矿山工作的西班牙船长打工。那座矿山海拔较低，主要生产锡、锌和铅。夜幕降临的时候，迭戈生了一堆火准备过夜。第二天早上，他发现火焰中石头融化后露出了银矿。关于这次发现还有其他传说，尽管许多当地人早已知道塞罗里科山有银矿，但瓦尔帕似乎确实在这次发现中扮演了一个重要角色。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
In 1544 or 1545 a Caecha man known as Diego de Walpa is credited with accidentally discovering silver at Cerro Rico. He appears to have been searching the mountain for a Caecha shrine and may have been working for a Spanish captain at a nearby mine, a mine at a much lower elevation that primarily produced tin, zinc and lead. As night fell, Diego is said to have started a fire to camp for the night and by morning he saw veins of silver that had melted from stone in the flames. Other legends around the discovery also exist and while many locals already knew of the silver at Cerro Rico, Walpa does seem to have played a role in its discovery.
他在几份西班牙资料中被提及，包括他向一位西班牙牧师所做的宣誓证词。 一位本地酋长写道：“告诉他们，坏人瓦尔帕需要被惩罚，因为他发现了波托西。” 对于西班牙人来说，这是一件幸运的事情，而对当地居民来说却非常不幸，因为瓦尔帕偶然发现了世界上最富有的银矿床。 到了1545年4月，波托西的第一座矿井开业，这座历史上最重要的采矿中心之一开始建设。当初的采矿主要使用印加人制作的陶土与石头花盆炉。他们依靠从山坡上吹下来的风来助燃木炭火，有大约15000个这样的炉子分布在山上，用来从开采的矿石中冶炼银。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
He's mentioned in several Spanish sources including a sworn statement he made to a Spanish priest. One native chief wrote, "Tell them that the bad man, Walpa, needs to be punished because he has discovered Potosi." Fortunately for the Spanish and very unfortunately for the local population, Walpa had stumbled upon the richest silver deposits in the world. By April of 1545 the first mine in Potosi opened and the first buildings of what would become one of the most important mining centers in history had begun. Initially the mining was largely done using Inca clay and stone flowerpot furnaces. They relied on wind coming down the slopes of the mountain to fuel the charcoal fires and some 15,000 of them dotted the mountain to melt silver from the extracted ore.
从矿山开采出来的大量白银使人们说哈罗里科就是由白银组成的。波托西位于海拔近13,500英尺的高地，是世界上最高的城市之一。一位西班牙人曾写道，波托西位于寒冷、积雪覆盖、贫瘠、无果且几乎无法居住的高原上。1547年，这座城市有14,000名居民。50年后，人口增加了十倍，达到150,000，超过了许多欧洲城市的规模。最初的矿脉富含纯银，易于开采。即便是在波托西被发现之前，西班牙人的发现已经颠覆了全球市场。来自极其富有的印加帝国的无数财富，价值数百万比索，推动了全球市场。对银的需求源自中国，使得来自安第斯山脉的白银源源不断地流入市场。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
The sheer volume of silver coming from the mines led to the saying that Haro Rico was made of silver. Potosi sits at nearly 13,500 feet above sea level making it one of the highest cities in the world. One Spaniard wrote that Potosi is situated in cold, snow-covered, sterile, fruitless and almost uninhabitable highlands. In 1547 the city held 14,000 people. 50 years later it increased tenfold to 150,000 becoming larger than many European cities. The first veins were rich in pure silver which was easy to extract. Even before the discovery of Potosi the discoveries by the Spanish had upended global markets. Millions of pesos worth of treasures came from the fabulously wealthy Incan empire and it drove global markets. His demand for silver in China kept silver from the Andes flowing.
明朝从纸币转向使用硬币，而银子是中国从西方世界真正需要的少数商品之一。在《国富论》中，亚当·斯密对银贸易的影响力表现出了特别的兴趣，因为一种商品就能够将全球市场连接在一起。而波托西出产的银则改变了游戏规则。在16世纪下半叶，西属秘鲁的哈罗里科矿山生产了90%的银，占1550到1600年间全球银产量的60%。于是出现了一句俗语：“值一个波托西”，意思是价值极高。银子通过骡子和骆驼被运送到布宜诺斯艾利斯和巴拿马城，然后穿过加勒比海运往西班牙，或者被送到菲律宾的马尼拉，再流入中国。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
The Ming dynasty had shifted from paper money to coins and silver was one of the only goods China actually wanted from the west. In his wealth of nations, Adam Smith expressed a particular interest in the reach of the silver trade because a single item of commerce tied markets together globally. But the silver found at Potosi was game-changing. In the second half of the 16th century, Haro Rico mines produced 90% of the silver that would come from the viceroyalty of Peru, as much as 60% of the total silver mined in the world between 1550 and 1600. A saying appeared, worth a Potosi, meaning to be worth a great value. Silver was carried by mule and llama to points of Buenos Aires and Panama City and from there made its way to Spain across the Caribbean or to Manila in the Philippines and from there to China.
1559年，哈布斯堡皇帝查理五世授予该镇“皇帝别墅”的称号，并称其为“世界的宝库”。两年后，西班牙国王费利佩二世赠送给该镇一块雕刻精美的盾牌，上面写着：“为了强大的皇帝，为了智慧的国王，这座银山可以征服世界。”这些财富资助了一个类似军事工业综合体的体系，使哈布斯堡帝国能够涉足众多战争，以扩大其影响力。到1565年，最便捷和富饶的矿脉已被开采殆尽，银矿产量锐减。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
In 1559, the Habsburg emperor Charles V bestowed the title Imperial Villa upon the town and called it the Treasury of the World. Two years later, Spanish King Felipe II gifted the town an ornate shield with the engraving, "For the powerful emperor, for the wise king, this mountain of silver could conquer the world." The money financed a kind of military industrial complex that allowed the Habsburg empire to engage in a dizzying number of conflicts to expand its influence. By 1565, the most convenient and rich veins had been fully exploited and silver production dwindled.
在1569年，弗朗西斯科·德·托莱多被任命为秘鲁总督。托莱多成为了一个极其有效但具破坏性的行政官。他立刻开始了一个雄心勃勃的计划，以中央集权管理殖民政府，并增加采矿收入。他还推行了托莱多改革，其中定义了米塔制度，这个制度迫使当地土著人群为西班牙王室劳作。担任秘鲁总督者都必须将大量精力集中在波托西的矿山上。自1568年至1570年，西班牙美洲的第一批硬币开始铸造，托莱多下令在波托西建造造币厂。这座建筑耗资巨大，以至于西班牙国王感叹整座建筑就好像用纯银建造的一样。托莱多命令铺设道路、建造第一座教堂，并设立数百座磨坊用于研磨银矿石，这些磨坊由32座水坝提供动力。他还引入了一种新的提炼银的方法，保证了该城市在未来几十年的繁荣。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
In 1569, Francisco de Toledo was made viceroy of Peru. Toledo would make for a terribly effective and destructive administrator. He immediately began an ambitious program to centralize colonial government and bring in greater mining revenue. He also instituted the Toledo reforms, which defined the Mita program, which forced the native populations to labor for the crown. Any viceroy of Peru would have had to focus much of his time on the mines in Potosi. Between 1568 and 1570, the first coins minted in Spanish America appeared and Toledo ordered a mint built in Potosi. The building was so expensive that the Spanish king remarked that the whole building must be made of pure silver. Toledo ordered the roads paved, the first church built, and hundreds of mills to grind silver ore, powered by 32 dams. He also introduced a new way of extracting the silver, which would guarantee the city's ascendancy for decades to come.
1554年，巴托洛梅·德·梅迪纳被认为开发了利用汞合金从混合矿石中提炼银的庭院法。在美洲，银通常以化合物形式存在，需要使用汞合金进行精炼。矿石被磨成细砂，与多种成分混合，铺在一个浅平的庭院上，然后暴露在阳光下。化学反应将银提取到汞合金中，然后通过加热蒸发汞，只留下银。在波托西，一种改进后的方法将原本需要六到八周的等待时间缩短至10到20小时，采用一种加热的铜器皿进行提炼，这种方法在寒冷的安第斯山脉更为有效。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
In 1554, Bartolome de Medina is credited with developing the patio method for extracting silver, which uses mercury amalgamation to recover silver from mixed ore. Silver in the Americas was often found as a compound, which required mercury amalgamation for refinement. Ore is ground into a fine sand and mixed with several ingredients, spread on a shallow walled patio, and then left in the sun. A chemical reaction extracts the silver into a mercury amalgamation, and the mercury is then heated and vaporized, leaving only the silver. At Potosi, a refined process decreased the six to eight week wait time to 10 to 20 hours, using the pan method, a heated copper vessel that was much more effective in the cold Andes.
托莱多的工作确保了波托西继续为西班牙王室赚取财富，但这对当地居民来说代价巨大。每年，来自20万平方英里范围内的1.3万名安第斯男性被迫在波托西矿山劳作，相当于该地区每七名成年男子中就有一人被征召。矿井深达500米，建设粗糙，经常缺乏空气。当地工人要背负数百磅矿石，沿着摇摇欲坠的梯子，从矿井深处的高温地带走到安第斯山脉寒冷的地面上。附近还有一个汞矿，被用来提炼金属。汞矿的工作极其危险和致残，以至于被俗称为“死亡计”。工人们常因汞中毒、肺炎以及矿井坍塌等事故而丧命。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
Toledo's work ensured that Potosi would continue making money for the Spanish crown, though at a great cost to the local population. Every year, 13,000 Andean men from an area of 200,000 square miles were forced to labor at the Potosi mines, about one out of every seven adult males in the region. The mines could go 500 meters deep, and they were carelessly built and often airless, and native workers carried hundreds of pounds of ore up rickety ladders from the furnace heat of the deep mines to the frigid air of the Andes. A nearby mercury mine was also found to supply the amalgamation. Work in the mercury mines was so dangerous and crippling that it was colloquially called the death meter. Workers often died of mercury poison, pneumonia, and accidents such as falls and mine collapses.
一位矿老板写道：“如果周一有20个健康的工人进去，到了周六可能有一半会变成残疾。” 到了17世纪后期，上秘鲁（今天主要是现代玻利维亚）在西班牙人统治下失去了半数的土著人口，因为死亡和当地人逃避命运。那些幸存下来的人通常会继续留在波托西，因为从他们家乡到波托西的路费比他们在那里工作的收入还高。如果他们留在波托西，他们有机会作为受雇的工人赚钱，并且可以免于未来被征召进米塔制度。人口减少只会加剧问题，到1600年，每年有近一半合适年龄的男性人口在矿井工作。另一位观察者写道，在被迫进入矿井的7,000名安第斯人中，只有大约2,000人返回，而另外5,000人中，有些人死去了，还有一些人留了下来。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
One mine boss wrote, "If 20 healthy workers enter on Monday, half may emerge crippled on Saturday." By the late 1600s upper Peru, today mostly modern Bolivia, had lost half of its indigenous population, thanks to death under the Spanish and locals fleeing their fate. Those that survive often remained in Potosi beyond their initial stay, because traveling from their homes to Potosi cost more than they earned working there. If they stayed in Potosi, they had a chance to make money as paid workers, and were exempt from future drafts into the Mita. The depopulation only exacerbated the problem, and by 1600, nearly half of the eligible male population worked in the mines in any given year. Another observer wrote that of 7,000 Andeans forced to go into the mines, only some 2,000 return, and of the other 5,000, some die, and others stay.
汞还对环境造成了广泛的损害，污染了溪流并破坏了当地的生态系统。矿山经历过繁荣与萧条，但对于波托西而言，迄今为止最大的灾难发生在17世纪中期。波托西的铸币厂主要由非洲奴隶操作，他们每年处理大量白银，1630年代平均每年加工300,000磅。西班牙人试图将尽可能多的宝贵金属运往欧洲，为此他们制造了一种称为"cob"的不规则银币，这种钱币是按重量定义的。cob这个词通常被认为来自西班牙语中的"cabo"，意为末端，因为这些金属块会被从金属条上切下，然后称重，再用锤子印上标记。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
The mercury also caused widespread damage to the environment, polluting streams and destroying local ecology. The mines had their booms and busts, but by far the greatest disaster to ever befall Potosi occurred in the middle of the 17th century. The mint at Potosi was worked mostly by African slaves, who processed a huge amount of silver, an average of 300,000 pounds per year through the 1640s. The Spanish attempted to move as much of this precious metal as they could to Europe, and to do this they produced cobs, irregular silver coins defined by weight. The term cob is usually thought to come from the term cabo, meaning end, because the chunks of metal would be cut off metal bars and weighed before being stamped by a hammer.
如果这些硬币太重，就可以简单地剪下一部分。许多这样的硬币是著名的八块银币，面值为八个西班牙里亚尔，含银量达到93%。这使得银币易于运输，并且可以在旅程中的任何阶段用作货币。它推动了美洲的贸易路线，刺激了港口城市的经济，然后被装上船运往欧洲。西班牙里亚尔和铸币在全球范围内被接受，欧洲、殖民地、亚洲，甚至在非洲市场都广泛流通。铸币也被称为“海盗铸币”，因为海盗常常在这些硬币前往欧洲的途中截获它们，铸币是从沉船中打捞出的硬币中数量相当多的一类。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
If the coins were too heavy, pieces could simply be clipped off. Many of these coins were the famous pieces of eight, valued at eight Spanish reales, and meant to be 93% silver. This made the silver easy to transport, and it could be used as money at any stage of the journey. It powered trade routes through the Americas, and stimulated the economy of port cities, before being packed onto ships that headed for Europe. Spanish reales and cobs were accepted globally, traded in markets in Europe, the colonies, Asia, and even extensively in Africa. Cobbs had also come to be known as pirate cobs, because pirates often captured them on their way to Europe, and cobs make up a large number of the coins pulled out of shipwrecks.
虽然“锭币”在使用上很实用，但它们引发了许多问题。由于这些硬币形状不规则，重量往往达不到预期，还可能被剪裁而不易被察觉。随着硬币在全球流通，人们会剪去一些银子，但仍按面值使用，进一步使硬币贬值。但随之曝光的丑闻更为严重。在丑闻曝光之前，有关这些硬币的传闻就已经在流传。到了1640年代，印度的港口开始完全拒收这些硬币，随后欧洲的港口也效仿。莫卧儿时期的印度则将其作为废品卖给贵金属商人。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
Though practical, cobs introduced a host of issues. Because the coins were irregularly shaped, they were rarely the weight that they were meant to be, and could be clipped without appearing to be tampered with. As the coins made their way around the world, people clipped off their own pieces of silver and passed the coin off at face value, further debasing the coin. But the scandal that broke went much deeper. Even before the scandal broke, rumors about the coins were circulating, and the 1640s ports in India began rejecting the coins altogether. European ports would do so as well. Mughal India sold them as scrap to bullion dealers.
在波托西，造币厂指责奴隶，称他们在银中添加锡和其他金属，并偷窃银子。1648年，卡斯蒂利亚的阿拉贡抱怨说，这些硬币的实际价值仅相当于五雷亚尔，而非八雷亚尔的价值。西班牙的调查发现，波托西的硬币平均只含有规定含量的75%的银。国王费利佩派前任宗教裁判官前往波托西进行调查。在波托西，验证硬币纯度的测量员一职经常被拍卖，测量员们竭尽全力使自己获利。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
In Potosi, the Mint blamed the slaves, claiming that they were adding tin and other metals, and stealing the silver. In 1648, Aragon of Castile complained that the coins were worth as little as five reales, instead of eight. Spanish oil investigations proved that Potosi coins contained an average of only 75% of the silver they were meant to have. King Felipe sent a former inquisitor to Potosi to investigate. In Potosi, the job of assayer, who verified the coin's purity, was regularly auctioned off, and the assayers did their best to enrich themselves.
虽然他们指责、折磨甚至处决了奴隶，但奴隶向宗教裁判所报告称，他们半夜被命令去降低硬币的含银量，而验银师和其他人却从这些劣质硬币中大发横财。这种腐败行为渗透进了整个银币制造过程。前政府官员弗朗西斯科·戈麦斯·德·拉·罗查和他的合伙人、验银师胡安·拉米雷斯因欺诈罪被处决，其他大多数官员则被罚款或免职。新的验银师胡安·罗德里格斯·德·罗达斯被任命负责此事，但尽管他制造的币，被称为Rodazes，以区别于劣质币，质量较好，但仍未达到规定的含银量。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
While they blamed, tortured, and even executed slaves, the slaves reported to the inquisitor that they were ordered to debase the coins in the middle of the night, while the assayers and others made a fortune off the debased coinage. The corruption permeated the entire silver operation. Francisco Gomez de la Rocha, a former government official, and his partner Juan Ramirez, the assayer, were executed for the fraud, and most other officials were fined or removed from their positions. A new assayer, Juan Rodriguez de Rodas, was put in charge, but while his coins, called Rodazes, to differentiate them from the debased coins, were better, they were still short of the required silver content.
为了应对丑闻，西班牙王室将所有的八里亚尔硬币贬值为六里亚尔。在波托西，采取的措施略有不同，新铸造的硬币被贬值为七里亚尔半，而旧硬币则贬值为六里亚尔。不幸的是，由于硬币制作质量低劣，许多造假者能够把旧的六里亚尔硬币改造成面值为七里亚尔半，这导致在波托西铸造的所有硬币的价值都受到了影响。从那时起，硬币上必须标有化验员印记和铸币厂标记。然而，这并没有结束丑闻的后果。17世纪被称为危机时期，而世界上第一个全球硬币的贬值也加剧了这一灾难性的局面。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
Desperate to deal with the scandal, the Spanish crown devalued all of the eight reale coins to six reales. At Potosi, the solution was slightly different, with the new coins devalued to seven and a half, while the old ones were devalued to six. Unfortunately, the poor coin strikes meant that many fraudsters were able to remake the old six reale coins up to seven and a half, which ruined the value of all the coins minted at Potosi. From that point, the coins were required to have an assayer mark, as well as a mint mark. That didn't end the consequences of the scandal. The 17th century has been called a period of crisis, and the debasement of the world's first global coin played a part in that disastrous period.
哈布斯堡王朝在欧洲资助战争，几乎完全依靠美洲的白银。全球局势不稳定。明朝在1644年灭亡，部分原因是突然缺乏白银。欧洲各国几乎一直处于战争状态。波托西丑闻震动了金融界，引发了蔓延欧洲、非洲和亚洲货币市场的恐慌。一些地区的贸易停滞不前，西班牙货币失去了信誉。1652年终于铸造了新币，但秘鲁硬币的声誉再也没有恢复。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
Wars were financed across Europe by the Habsburgs, financed almost entirely by American silver. Instability was global. The Ming Dynasty fell in China in 1644, partially due to a sudden lack of silver. European states were engaged in nearly constant war. The Potosi scandal rocked the financial world, causing a panic that spread through money houses in Europe, Africa, and Asia. Trade ground to a halt in some areas with Spanish currency discredited. New coins were finally minted in 1652, but the reputation of Peruvian coins never recovered.
波托西的矿山仍在运作，但由于银价下跌，一部分重心已转向锡和其他金属。人们相信那座山仍然蕴含着大量的白银，但在波托西矿山工作仍然非常危险。波托西矿工的平均寿命仅为40岁，而“埃罗里科”被称为“吃人的山”。这座山因开采而布满隧道，山顶甚至开始下沉。世界上有几个地方以波托西命名，可能是希望复制其传说中的财富，比如墨西哥的圣路易斯波托西，以及美国威斯康星州的波托西、密歇根州的波托西和内华达州的波托西鬼镇。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
The mines still run at Potosi, although decreasing silver prices mean that some of the emphasis has shifted to tin and other metals. The mountain is still believed to contain an enormous amount of silver, and it's still very dangerous to mine at Potosi. The average lifespan of a Potosi miner is just 40 years, and Jero Rico is called the mountain who eats men. That mountain is so honeycombed by mines that the summit is physically sinking. There are several places in the world that are named after Potosi, perhaps in hopes of replicating its legendary wealth, like San Luis Potosi, Mexico, and Potosi, Wisconsin, Potosi, Michigan, and the ghost town of Potosi, Nevada.
这些矿山对人类历史的影响难以言表。它们创造了第一个全球货币，催生了第一个真正的全球贸易，从而带动了对银行家、放贷人和贸易商的新需求。这是全球化的一部分，历史学家用它来定义从中世纪到早期现代时期的过渡。银矿的吸引力推动了欧洲对美洲的殖民，加速了印加帝国和阿兹特克等新大陆帝国的衰落，并导致了对原住民的征服和种族灭绝，同时也推动了大西洋奴隶贸易的发展。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
It's really difficult to overstate the impact that these mines had on human history. They created the first global currency, which created the first truly global trade, which drove a new demand for people as bankers and money lenders and traders. It was part of the globalization that we historians used to literally define the transition from the middle ages to the early modern period. The draw of that silver drove European colonization of the Americas, which hastened the decline of new world empires like the Incas and the Aztecs, and led to the subjugation and genocide of native populations, was growing the Atlantic slave trade.
西班牙银币为欧洲宗教战争和海盗的黄金时代提供了资金。贸易的全球化把基督教传播到了世界各地。然后，这种货币的衰落以及1649年的一系列丑闻加速了西班牙帝国的衰亡，历史再次被改写。在这一真空中，新的帝国如大英帝国崛起。简而言之，我们所知的现代世界很大程度上是由波托西矿山出产的白银塑造的。
▶ 英文原文 ⏱
The pieces of eight funded the European wars of religion, and the golden age of piracy. The globalization of trade brought Christianity around the world. And then having transformed history already, the decline of the currency and the disaster of the 1649 scandals changed history again by hastening the decline of the Spanish empire, and in that vacuum rose new empires like the British empire. Simply put, much of the modern world as we know it was defined by the silver from the mines at Potosi.
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▶ 英文原文 ⏱
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▶ 英文原文 ⏱
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