The military power of the Spanish Empire in the New World started to decline when King Philip IV of Spain was succeeded by King Charles II (1665-1700). The colonial governors of the Caribbean increasingly made use of buccaneers as mercenaries and privateers to guard their colonies. The late 17th and early 18th centuries (particularly between the years 1716 to 1726) are often considered the "Golden Age of Piracy" in the Caribbean, and pirate ports experienced rapid growth in the areas in and surrounding the Atlantic and Indian Oceans. Furthermore, during this time period there were approximately 2400 men that were currently active pirates. The Spanish, despite being the most powerful state in Christendom at the time, could not afford a sufficient military presence to control such a vast area of ocean or enforce their exclusionary, mercantilist trading laws. These laws allowed only Spanish merchants to trade with the colonists of the Spanish Empire in the Americas. This legal arrangement allowed for constant smuggling to break the Spanish trading laws and new attempts at Caribbean colonization in peacetime by England, France and the Netherlands. Whenever a war was declared in Europe between the Great Powers the result was always widespread piracy throughout the Caribbean. Freebooters and privateers, experienced after decades of European warfare, pillaged and plundered the almost defenseless Spanish settlements with ease. Economically, the late 17th century and the early 18th century was a time of growing wealth and trade for all the nations who controlled territory in the Caribbean. By the 18th century the Bahamas had become the new colonial frontier for the British. The port of Nassau became one of the last pirate havens.

• Authentic Spanish "Pirate Money"
• Heavily counter-stamped with earthen deposits
• Obverse: Castle within shield with crown
• Reverse: Lion within shield with crown
• The era of piracy in the Caribbean began in the 16th century and died out in the 1830s after the navies of the nations of Western Europe and North America with colonies in the Caribbean began combating pirates. The period during which pirates were most successful was from the 1660s to 1730s. Piracy flourished in the Caribbean because of the existence of pirate seaports such as Port Royal in Jamaica, Tortuga in Haiti, and Nassau in the Bahamas.

Authentic Spanish "Pirate Money"JABB Coin Consultants