Measures & Currencies

Our Benitz family history involves the currencies and measures of Argentina, Germany, Mexico, UK, USA, and Venezuela.  This page explains how we arrive at modern equivalents for past measures and monetary values of the 19th century when each country, state, province, or even city had its own systems.  Systems that are today unfamiliar to us - and to say the least, confusing.

We include measuring systems referenced in family or legal documents.  Our modern standards are the metric system and US Dollars.  We include the past English / US system of measures for those still familiar with it and for the holdouts (US, Myanmar [Burma], & Liberia) who have not yet adopted the metric system.

Metrification: Argentina c. 1885, Germany c. 1870, Mexico 1860's, Spain 1850's, Venezuela c. 1915, UK / Canada / Australia, et al 1970's.

Click on the following to access:

• Distances & Lengths
• Land Area
• Weights & Volumes
• Currency Values

Sources:

They do conflict, so welcome to the fun!

Argentina:

Spreadsheets created from the work of Juan Alvarez, “Temas de historia económica argentina”, Buenos Aires, El Ateneo, 1929.  The measuring systems used the same terms but varied in size by province and usage (urban vs. rural).  We are concerned with only the rural measures of Córdoba and Santa Fé - and have included Buenos Aires because of its political & commercial importance.  Metrified c. 1885.

Germany:

TheGerman measuring systems varied by city and state - thankfully, we have not encountered them (yet) in our family history and so have omitted them.  However, see the cautionary note with the letters written to Thadeus Benitz in Germany by his brothers in the US.  There were three German currencies, and those we have included.  Metrified c. 1870.

Spain & Mexican California:

See the work of Kenneth Pauley, California Mission Studies Association and the Rescate de antiguas medidas - it includes an interesting historical perspective.  We have not found a definitive work on California weights & volumes and so have used the Mexican standards.  Spain went metric in the late 1850's, Mexico in the 1860's.

US:

See the NIST Handbook - includes conversion to metric.  Has not metrified.

Venezuela:

Haven't got there yet.  We will include them when we expand the pages on Alexander, et al, and the Colonia Tovar.  Metrified c. 1915.

 

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Distances & Lengths:

Modern:

 

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Old Spanish Measures:

The Spanish system of measures contained the following units - there were many more than those we list here.  The official Spanish vara de Burgos (or vara de Castilla) was set by royal Spanish edict in 1801 and measured 0.8359 meters (32.909 inches).

Mexican California 1840's:

The official vara had 22 accepted variations in California prior to the Treaty of Guadalupe-Hidalgo of 1847, which set the vara at 33 inches.  New variations upon 33 inches arose in south-west US until 1855 when the Texas vara was set at 33.333 inches.

US California 1850+:

Deeds and survey maps used the following survey measures, still in use today:

 

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Argentina, pre-metric:

Prior to metrification in 1885, the Argentine system of distance & length measures (established in 1835) recognized the following units, to which we added cuarta (it appears in our family documents and has been described variously as equal to ¼ of a vara, or as the width of a spread hand) and the vara de Bustinza (a measure local to Santa Fé). 

 

 

 

 

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Land Measures:

Modern:

 

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Mexican California 1840's:

Please bear in mind that many survey maps of the early 1800's were estimates made without benefit of proper measurement, e.g. California diseños (survey maps) of the 1840's were often made a ojo (estimated by eye).  The 2.6% maximum variance in the standard Mexican land measure of the 1840's, sitio de ganado mayor, pales in comparison to the huge errors in mapping and translation - witness the legal problems Wilhelm's inaccurate diseño (made a ojo from the back of a horse) caused the subsequent owners of Rancho Herman.

Fanega de Sembradura:

The highly inexact area sown by a fanega of seed.  Its size varies enormously, e.g. corn (0.6 - 8.8 acres) or wheat (0.15 - 1.8 acres).  The sizes in the above table were used by Governor Vallejo for wheat sown at Fort Ross in 1841.

Sitio de Ganado Mayor:

During the first half of the 1800's in Mexico, of which California and Texas were part, large land grants were measured in sitios de ganado mayor (or sitios) - often translated into English as leagues without proper qualification.  Originally one sitio de ganado mayor was the amount of land considered necessary for a cattle ranch, however, land grants most often consisted of several sitios de ganado mayor.  A sitio de ganado mayor was a square of 5,000 x 5,000 varas.  Simple enough, except that the length of the vara varied over time and place - see above.  It was also considerably smaller than the Spanish or Argentine legua (of 6,666.7 or 6,000 varas per side respectively).

 

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Argentina 1835-1885, pre-metric:

Cuadra:

Crop yields and land prices were quoted in cuadras. (Some of the older colonos were still using it in the 1950's. To further confuse crop yields, they used the old quintal of approx. 46 kg. and not the metric quintal of 100 kg.!)

Legua:

Argentina, the size of estancias (aka: camps or ranches) are often broadly described in leguas de campo or leagues of land.   In modern terms, a legua or league is a metric square league - we include it here for easier comparison.

Suerte de estancia:

An old term, still used occasionally.

 

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Weights & Volumes:

Modern:

 

 

US Bushel:

In spite of being a volume measure it persists in the US for stating crop yields and prices (yet measuring is done by weighing, the weights are then converted to bushels!).  Being a volume measure, the weight of each seed is dependent on its density (we leave it to the farmers amongst us to adjust for moisture and foreign material).  The following table lists the Standard US Bushel weights by crop.

Conversion between US Bushels & Metric:

The following table contains multipliers for converting crop yields between quintales por hectarea (qq./ha.) and bushels per acre (bu./ac.) - the common measures of Argentina and the US.  A quintal is a colloquial term for 100 kilograms, inherited from an older now obsolete measure.

 

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Mexican California 1840's:

The following are selected Mexican measures from Rescate de Antiguas Medidas.  We have not discovered a definitive study of Californian measures.  We doubt the accuracy of the volume (both dry & fluid) conversion factors - their relative values don't appear to be simple multiples of the next smaller unit, as would be expected. For example, a carga is exactly two fanegas (ok!), but a fanega is somewhat less than four cuarterones which does not make common sense.

 

 

The weight measures make sense; that is, their relative values are simple multiples of the next smaller unit.

 

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Argentina 1835-1885, pre-metric:

 

 

 

 

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Currency Values:

Estimating the value of money seems to be an art and not an exact science.

http://www.economics.utoronto.ca/munro5/MONEYLEC.htm

http://www.cyndislist.com/money.htm

Giving up on all the economic formulae, we decided to compare currency values in terms of US Dollars (close of 31 Dec., 2000) as follows:

• Convert to US Dollars, based upon contemporary exchange rates per the US Federal Reserve.
• Restate in US Dollars, 31 Dec., 2000, adjusting for inflation per the US Consumer Price Index (US-CPI).

However! See below our discussion below titled Worth, Buying Power, & Cost of Living for how this calculation almost certainly seriously undervalues prices and earnings of the 19th. century.

Currencies - Valued in US Dollars, Dec. 31, 2000:

 

Some Issues with Precious Metals & Currencies

Gold Standard:

It first emerged in the UK during the early 1700's, it was abandoned in 1790 (due to the Napoleonic wars) then resumed in 1819.  Its adoption spread during the 1800's - the US adopted it in 1879 (dropping its bimetal standard with silver).  It effectively placed the world economy on a single currency - the US Dollar was valued at 1.5047 grams (23.22 grains), the British Pound at 7.3224 grams (113.0 grains).  Attractive to entrepreneurs and capital rich countries (UK, US), it harmed the working class and primary product exporting countries (Argentina, Canada), and deepened economic down turns into depressions.  It collapsed with WW-I, was then resurrected for a short while until it was finally laid to rest by the Great Depression.  For more details, see:

http://www.huppi.com/kangaroo/L-gold.htm

http://www.cyberussr.com/hcunn/gold-std.html

Specie:

The ratio of silver ounces per gold ounce remained relatively stable at 15:1 or 16:1 until the mid to late 1870's when it began to slip with the discovery of large silver deposits.  At the close of 2000, the silver:gold ratio was 59:1.  In terms of the US-Consumer Price Index, both gold and silver were relatively much more expensive in the 19th. century than in the 20th.  In more recent times, the recession of 2007-2010 has greatly increased the demand for precious metals, dramatically increasing their current prices.  Because of their distorted prices, precious metals should not be used as a basis for comparing monetary values of today with those of the 19th. century.

Worth, Buying Power, & the Cost of Living

Worth:

From the Historical Text Archive:

“One of the most difficult tasks in dealing with the past is to get people to think historically about prices and income. Remembering what something cost 40 years ago does not tell us much; knowing how long the person had to work to acquire it does.”

Economists, when calculating inflation (i.e. the US-Consumer Price Index "CPI", used in the above table), exclude the cost of improvements to the standard of living (horse vs. combustion engine, candles vs. electric-light, pencil vs. computer).  That is, the above table badly underestimates the relative worth of a $1 (USD) earned then vs. now.

The Measuring Worth web-site (www.measuringworth.com) has attempted to measure the true modern value of a British pound earned in the past.  Per their calculator: £1 (UK pound) in 1875 when converted to pounds in 2000 is worth £55.70 (per the UK retail price index) vs. £383.00 (per the UK average earnings) - 6.8 times more when measured per earnings!!  It's risky to apply this multiplier outside its context, i.e. to earnings made in the US or Argentina.  However, we can devise multipliers of our own.  For example: the activities & skills of a cowboy have changed little during the past 100-150 years.  By several accounts, in about 1875 a cowboy earned $30 per month, or $360 per year, which when adjusted for inflation (per the US-CPI) is approx.  $7,800 per year in USD-2000 terms.  In 2003, the mean wage of a farm hand in New Mexico was $20,010 per year.  Comparing these wages for the same approx. work provides a multiplier of approx. 2.5 by which the US-CPI understimates the worth of a cowboy's wages in 1875 vs. 2000.

However inaccurate these multipliers may be (ours in particular), they provide a better understanding of the worth, in today's terms, of a dollar earned in 1875.

Buying Power:

Buying powere is what a unit of currency will buy in one place (city, country) versus another on a given date.  Here is an example from the Economist magazine (17 Jan.'04) - it showed how the buying power of the US Dollar varied geographically by converting to US dollars the local price of a McDonald's Big Mac hamburger: Switzerland $5.11, Euro area $3.48, USA $2.80, Argentina $1.43, China $1.23.  Same product, same currency, different price.

Cost of Living:

Cost of living is typically expressed in comparative terms, e.g. New York is twice as expensive to live in as Miami, Buenos Aires twice as expensive as Bahia Blanca.   You should be aware that:

• the cost of living in Argentina is typically considerably less than in the US or Europe (currently approx. 1/3), and

• the cost of living on a farm (fort, ranch, estancia) is typically half or less that of living in a city.

Brief Histories of the Currrencies:

Spain:

The Spanish Real de a Ocho reigned as the monetary standard in world trade for nearly 400 years, from 1500 until the late 1800's, giving birth to more than 50% of the world's currencies, including the US dollar.  The official name of the Spanish colonial and early Mexican currency was the Real de a Ocho (o Ocho Reales) - "pieces of eight" - which became known colloquially as a Peso, Peso Fuerte, o Peso Duro because of its unchanging weight in silver.  According to a Spanish Royal Ordenanza (decree) of 1497, 67 Reales were to be minted from a single Marco de Castilla of pure silver that weighed 230.465 grams (the standard weight of a Cologne Mark), i.e. each Real weighed 3.4335 grams and each Peso Duro weighed 27.4680 grams.  For more details, search the web for: “Marco de Castilla”, “Real de a Ocho”, and “pieces of eight”.

Argentina:

Following independence from Spain in 1810, Argentina continued to recognise the Spanish Peso Duro (known colloquially as a Patacón) as legal tender for a number of years.  The Peso Argentino, first emitted in 1812, fared badly during years of chaos until 1853 when order was restored.  In 1881 Argentina struck its first silver Peso, valued at 1:1 with the Peso Duro (Spanish Real de a Ocho).  However, it soon lost value when once again too many bank notes were printed.

Currrencies used by our ancestors when they first arrived in Argentina include the following:

• Spanish Real de a Ocho, a.k.a. Peso Duro, Peso Fuerte, Patacón.   During the 1860's and 1870's, Franz X. and Wilhelm Benitz paid for their land purchases in Pesos Duros.

• Bolivian currencies were used widely in Argentina during the 1880's.  See the letters and diaries of Frank J. and Alfred Benitz.

  •  Real Boliviano - the Bolivian sol replaced 1:1 the Real de a Ocho. 16 soles = 1 scudo.  The US Treasury in 1879 valued 1 real (sol) = USD 0.965. Coins were struck 1827-1864 in silver (soles: 1/2 to 8)  and gold (scudos: 1 to 8). (Search the web on: "Bolivian silver coins".)

  • Peso Boliviano - struck in silver 1864 (centésimos in copper), and pegged to 5 French francs (approx. 1.40 USD) it lost value over time.  In 1881, the US Treasury valued it at USD 0.823.  In May 1884, Alfred valued it at $0.80 m/n. (approx. USD 0.73).  In 1908 it revalued at 12.5 to 1 UK pound (approx. USD 0.39). Inflation continues, revalued in 1963, 1987, & ??

  • Bolivian Dollar - Frank J. Bz's term for the real boliviano.

•  Peso Cordobés, the provincial currency of Córdoba. a.k.a. soles, cuartillos, reales, realitos, & by Alfred: Cordoba nates. At sporadic intervals between 1815 and 1843, the province of Córdoba (also La Rioja) struck a few coins in various nominal values.  We don't know their true contemporary value in other currencies for they were struck in low quality silver and pewter (peltre).  Today they are collectors items. (Search the web on: "moneda provincial de Cordoba" and "moneda provincial de La Rioja".)

For more about Argentine currency, see:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argentine_Currency_Board

http://www.mundoandino.com/Argentina/Historical-exchange-rates-of-Argentine-currency

The value of one current peso is 10,000,000,000 pesos of 1969 (or 1914), and more than 13,000,000,000 pesos of 1914 with the U.S. dollar as reference."

Germany:

In very simplified terms, three currencies (there were many others, most local) were the basis of trade during the period that concerns us, 1830-1870: (1) Thaler - used in the northern principalities including Mecklenberg and Prussia; (2) Gulden - used in the southern principalities including Baden; and (3) Mark-Banco - used by Hamburg and Luebeck.  In 1871 the three currencies were consolidated into the Mark.  For more details, see the archives in:  http://www.germanlife.com

Mexico:

During the years we are concerned with, 1830-1850, Mexico continued with the Spanish Real de a Ocho (Peso Fuerte), minting its own - see Spain above.  For more details, see:

http://www.chicagocoinclub.org/projects/PiN/ccp.html

UK:

The British Pound became of interest to the family when they began travelling to Europe in the late 1800's and/or married British subjects or their Anglo-Argentine descendants.  Consequently, we include it here.  Since the 16th. century, one pound was 20 shillings or 240 pennies, that is, until 15 February, 1971, when the pound was decimalized with 100 (new pence) pennies.  For the rest of the old coins, find a good pub, offer a Brit a pint of ale and have him explain farthing, hapenny, pence, crown, guinea, etc. (Cheaper but less fun, search the web for: "England decimalisation").

US:

The US Dollar, the basis of our tables of comparison, has had its tribulations like any other currency.  Named after the German Thaler, its value was originally based upon the Spanish Real.

 

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