# Spain and gold

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/spain-and-gold/124818>\
**Category:** Cecil's Columns/Staff Reports\
**Created:** [August 21, 2002, 12:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/spain-and-gold/124818 "2002-08-21T00:42:51Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Beruang](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/77aa72/32.png) [@Beruang](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beruang)\
**Post date:** [August 21, 2002, 12:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/spain-and-gold/124818/1 "2002-08-21T00:42:51Z")

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In this column:

[http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a2\_437.html](http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a2_437.html)

Cecil neglects one pertinent fact: from 1519 to 1659, Hapsburg Spain was almost constantly at war – with France, with the Netherlands, with the Ottoman Turks, with Protestant Germany, with whomever. This of course was a significant drain on resources.

I learn this from Paul Kennedy’s “The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers,” which Cecil recommends here:

[http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a2\_437.html](http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a2_437.html)

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**Author:** ![Duck\_Duck\_Goose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/50afbb/32.png) [@Duck\_Duck\_Goose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duck_Duck_Goose)\
**Post date:** [August 22, 2002, 4:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/spain-and-gold/124818/2 "2002-08-22T16:12:00Z")

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So, what, you’re saying they _spent_ it? _All_ of it? [voice rises to an outraged squeak] The same way, when I ask my kid what he did with the money I just gave him, he says, “I spent it”?

Well, I hope they’re happy with their purchases, is all I can say. What’d they buy, anyway–42,682,793 sets of Yu-Gi-Oh cards and a CD player?