Depicts the seal of the United Mexican States.

The Seal of the United Mexican States is a modified version of the national coat of arms, with the addition of the full official name of the country Estados Unidos Mexicanos, in a semi-circular accommodation in the upper part of the seal. Current and past Mexican peso coinage have had the seal engraved on the obverse of all denominations.

The coat of arms depicts a Mexican golden eagle perched on a prickly pear cactus devouring a rattlesnake. To the people of Tenochtitlan this would have strong religious connotations, but to the Europeans, it would come to symbolize the triumph of good over evil (with the snake sometimes representative of the serpent in the Garden of Eden).

At the center, the image of the obverse of Second Empire coin, 1 Peso 1866 (KM# 388), Maximilian I of Mexico; at the upper side, parallel to the coin frame, the legend NUMISMATIC HERITAGE OF MEXICO; on the left side, the Mexican mint mark, while on the right field is the $100.

Ignacio Comonfort and Benito Juárez tried to introduce the use of a decimal system in Mexico’s minting. However, the difficulties at the time barely allowed putting into circulation 5 and 10 cent coins in 1863. Emperor Maximilian of Habsburg, in 1866, was the first to order the minting of one Peso coins in Mexico. During the Second Empire, decimal coins of 1 Cent (copper), 5, 10 and 50 Cents (silver), and 20 Pesos (gold) were minted.

The Mexican Empire or Second Mexican Empire was the name of Mexico under the regime established from 1864 to 1867 with the Second French intervention in Mexico. It was created by the Mexican Congress with the support of Napoleon III of France, who attempted to establish a monarchist ally in the Americas. A referendum confirmed the coronation of the Austrian Archduke Ferdinand Maximilian, of the House of Habsburg as Emperor Maximilian I of Mexico.