The Huancavelica Mercury Mine;: A contribution to the history of the Bourbon renaissance in the Spanish Empire by Arthur Preston Whitaker. Harvard University Press. Harvard Historical Monograph Series. (1941). 5 3/4 x 8  xiii, 150 pages Hardcover with no dust jacket.  Bright gilt lettering on the spine. Light tanning to the edges of the page block. Moderate cover edge wear. The small pink spot on the back cover, possibly from paint. Light bumping to cover tips. Previous owner's name in small lettered to black ink inside the front cover.  No other previous owner markings. No tears, folds or creases to pages. Binding is tight with no looseness to pages. Not ex-library, not remaindered and not a facsimile reprint. For sale by Jon Wobber, bookseller since 1978. JL25a

      "The deposits of Huancavelica were disclosed in 1564, or 1566, by the Indian Nahuincopa to his master Jerónimo Luis de Cabrera. The Spanish Crown appropriated them in 1570 and operated them until Peruvian independence in 1821. Considered the "greatest jewel in the crown", they eliminated the need to ship mercury from Almadén. A miners guild, Gremio de Mineros, administered the mines from 1577 until 1782. Production stopped from 1813 through 1835. In 1915 E.E. Fernandini took over ownership.[2]
      The area was the most prolific source of mercury in Spanish America, and as such was vital to the mining operations of the Spanish colonial era.[2] Mercury was necessary to extract silver from the ores produced in the silver mines of Peru, as well as those of Potosí in Upper Peru (now Bolivia), using amalgamation processes such as the patio process or pan amalgamation. Mercury was so essential that mercury consumption was the basis upon which the tax on precious metals, known as the quinto real ("royal fifth"), was levied.
       The extraction of the quicksilver in the socavones (tunnels) was extremely difficult. Every day before the miners came down, a mass for the dead was celebrated. Due to the need of numerous hand-workers and the high rate of mortality, the Viceroy of Peru Francisco de Toledo resumed and improved the pre-Columbian mandatory service of the mita. 
       Mercury, lead, and arsenic contamination owing to centuries of quicksilver mining in the city's surrounding expose approximately 19,000 of Huancavelica's residents to severe health threats.[8] Exposure to these toxics has been linked to neuropsychological damage, kidney damage, fertility problems, and cancer, amongst others." - wikipedia