THE BYZANTINE EMPIRE AND THE MIDDLE AGES

Yet, not a single one those Inca ornaments survives today, because the gold was melted down to make it easier to ship to Spain. What ornaments have survived to this day are mostly from Colombia, where the search for EI Dorado centered.

Even then, the Spaniards didn’t get all the Inca’s gold at first. More jewelry and ornaments were on the way when the Incas heard of their emperor’s death and buried or hid it. Much of that gold was later found by the Spaniards, who were not above using torture to sate their appetites for gold. Was all of it found? No one knows, but legends and stories of the lost Inca treasure persist today.

The Spanish treasure ships had to weather storms and pirates to get black to Spain. Both hurricanes and pirates took their toll. English privateers, operating with the tacit approval of Queen Elizabeth I, were pirates with polite name, and Sir Francis Drake’s voyage around the world started out as a treasure hunt for Spanish gold. That treasure hunt still not ever, as hunter today use modern technology to locate the wrecks of treasure ships and stake their claim to the gold and precious gems.