1000 réis commemorative silver coin
1898 (400 years of the India route) ・ silver ・ 19th century ・ Kingdom of Portugal
The reverse reads "400th anniversary of the discovery of India, 1498–1898"; the obverse pairs the portraits of Carlos I and Queen Amélia. The treasury was failing, convertibility suspended, and Africa conceded to Britain—yet at that century's end the kingdom engraved a four-hundred-year-old glory in silver. A commemorative coin is also a device for borrowing from the past what the present lacks.