A smiling sun

Sol de Mayo

(The various “Suns of May” or “Inca Suns” used across Latin America and further abroad. Image: Civixplorer.com)

The Europeans were the first to visit Argentina. In 1516, a time when Spanish sailors were searching for precious metals, they sailed into a beautiful wide estuary which they named “Rio de la Plata” or river of silver. They called the land Argentina, after the Latin word meaning silvery.

Three hundred years later, On July 20th, 1816, a few days after the Declaration of Independence from Spain, the Congress of Tucumán officially adopted the blue-and-white flag as the national symbol of the United Provinces of the Río de la Plata. This decision cemented the emblem created by General Manuel Belgrano as an expression of unity, freedom, and sovereignty for the new nation.

The flag had been raised for the first time on February 27th, 1812, on the banks of the Paraná River, in what is now the city of Rosario. However, it was not until after the Declaration of Independence on July 9th, 1816, that it received official recognition from Congress. Two years later, in 1818, the Sun of May was incorporated into the design that identifies the Official Flag of the Argentine Nation.

The addition of the Sun of May (or Sol de Mayo), was to depict the sun shining through the clouds of Buenos Aires on the 25th of May 1810, when Argentina established its first independent government.

The image of the sun with a face in Latin America goes back to “Inti” the Inca sun-god. Inti could be depicted as the sun face or as a full human figure with gold-disc face from which flames extend.

Obverse

The obverse of the coin today features the country name above, the “Sol de mayo”, and branches below.

Reverse

The reverse features a laurel branch on the left, with the value above the date to the right.

This coin was issued from 1976 – 1979. The country used the “Peso ley” from 1970 – 1983. In this currency, 1 Peso = 100 Centavos. This currency replaced the “Peso moneda nacional” (Peso, national currency) which was used from 1881 – 1969. In this older currency, 1 Peso still equalled 100 Centavos, and 5 Pesos = 1 Argentino.

Latin American Coinage

The sun has appeared on the coinage of most Latin American countries:

• 126 coins from Argentina
• 35 coins from Uruguay
• 24 coins from Honduras
• 23 coins from Bolivia
• 18 coins from Mexico
• 15 coins from Nicaragua
• 15 coins from Guatemala
• 13 coins from Peru
• 5 coins from Ecuador
• 1 coin from Venezuela

There are probably many I missed – that was just a quick search for “sun” in each of those countries on Numista. There may have been some where it was listed as “Inti” or “sol” etc, and some of those listed may not have been specifically representing this idea, but simply a landscape which happened to include the sun in the sky. I did go back and do a search for “Sol de mayo”. It returns three common coins, all from Argentina, and which all mention “Sun” as well so would have been picked up in the search above. But it’s certainly a starting point if you are looking to get into collecting coins featuring the Sun. In fact, a search for “sun” across Numista, finds 2025 coins with “sun” somewhere in the description. These searches so far have all been for common circulating coins. If you expand that to ANY coins, Numista lists 4255 “Sun” coins, and if you include tokens, medallions, banknotes and paper exonumia, the number goes up to 6852 objects depicting the sun.

(My eclipse medallion, featuring the corona of the sun around the moon).

I have previously featured a coin from Uruguay with a puma walking across the sun, one from Nepal with a sun, a Georgian sun representation, and a medallion featuring a solar eclipse.

Do you collect any sun objects? Do let us know!

(A 1930 Uruguay 10 Centésimos featuring a puma walking across in front of the sun).

Empenadas

This coin was the #MysteryCoin for the fortnight 18 July – 1 August 2026. In guessing the answer, follower Dani noted: “Argentinian empanadas are very delicious” That is definitely the kind of fact I can get behind researching! Laylita’s Recipes tells me: “Empanadas mendocinas are traditional Argentinean baked empanadas filled with beef, onions, paprika, hot pepper powder, cumin, oregano, hard-boiled egg and olives. Another important part of these empanadas – and empanadas in general – is the churito or repulgue – ie the curvy ornate seal.