Boot of Cortez: The largest surviving gold nugget ever discovered in the Western Hemisphere
Discovered in 1989 by an amateur prospector using a Radio Shack metal detector in Mexico's Sonoran Desert, the "Boot of Cortez" is the largest surviving gold nugget ever found in the Western Hemisphere. Weighing 389.4 troy ounces (over 26 pounds) and measuring nearly 11 inches tall, the boot-shaped specimen is composed of roughly 80 percent gold, with the remainder consisting of silver and quartz. Named after Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés, the nugget was initially sold by its finder to his employer for $30,000 before eventually fetching more than $1.5 million at auction in 2008.
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