The system of outline money from Qin and Han dynasties to Ming and Qing dynasties can be divided into two stages:
The first stage: the Qin, Han, Sui and Tang dynasties were dominated by copper coins, which was a dual-system stage dominated by Qin's "half two coins" and Han's "five two coins".
The second stage: from the Tang, Song and Ming dynasties, the year number of coins was cleared, and the Bowen system was different from the first two systems, and the paper money and silver standard system also appeared.
The next narrative.
A preliminary study of pre-Qin currency
During the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, with the development of commodity economy, the metal weighing currency that needs to be divided and identified in circulation gradually became unsuitable and was replaced by metal coins. From the Spring and Autumn Period to the stage of metal coinage to the Warring States Period, four currency systems, namely cloth coin, knife coin, ant nose coin and ring coin, were established successively:
Cloth coins (such as cloth) are popular in the Central Plains, namely the royal families of Zhao, Han, Wei and Zhou. Cloth coins are born out of bronze shovel-shaped farm tools, which is the homonym of "cloth". The cloth coins in the Spring and Autumn Period were mainly hollow cloth, that is, hollow coins with handles. The cloth coins in the Warring States period were mainly flat-shouldered cloth, that is, compared with the "empty-shouldered cloth", they had no hollow handle, but were shaped like shovel-shaped copper sheets. The shapes of cloth coins can be roughly divided into flat shoulders, flat shoulders, round shoulders and square feet, pointed feet and round feet. The most common ones are flat-shouldered cloth or square-shouldered feet, which evolved from round-shouldered feet and later extended to Chu and Yan States.
Qi in the east and Yan in the north mainly use knife coins. Knife coins are divided into "Yan Ming Dao" and "Qi Dao Hua". The shape of knife coins is similar to that used by northern nomadic people such as Shanrong and Beidi. Because the face of the knife has the word "Hua", it is called "Dao". The back of knife coin is divided into arc back, folded back and straight back, and the cutter head is divided into flat head and pointed head. It was also an early copper coin in China.
The state of Qin in the northwest used ring coins alone, and its shape evolved from a spinning wheel or a jade wall. There are two kinds of ring coins: round hole and square hole. During the Warring States Period, round holes were cast earlier, and Wang Huiwen and Qin Shihuang in the late Qin Dynasty cast "half-liang" coins with round holes. Circular money is the original state of square hole money. The copper shell cast by Chu State in the south is called Ant Nose Money, which evolved from shell coins. Qian Wen, a copper shell, looks like a grimace, which is a combination of two characters. An ant's small nose means small money. Chu has bronze shell coins commonly known as "face money" and "ant nose money". In addition to ant nose money, Chu also has gold as the weighing currency, which is the only country in the Warring States period that used gold as the currency.
In a word, the four monetary systems in the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period evolved from the tools of labor production such as knives, shovels and spinning wheels, which showed the regional characteristics and social features of economic life such as fighting, fishing and hunting, pottery making, textiles and trade exchanges. At the same time, the formation of the four major currency areas is also the product of the warlord regime. With the development of economy and commodity trade. The mutual circulation of currencies in various countries requires and correspondingly promotes the trend of unification and standardization of monetary systems.
"Half Liang Qian" in Qin and Han Dynasties
After Qin unified the six countries, political unity needed economic unity as the basis. Qin Shihuang followed the historical development trend and unified writing, weights and measures and currency. It is stipulated that "gold" is the upper currency, 20 taels is the unit, and copper coins with round holes are the lower currency and half taels are the unit. Qian Wen's "half Liang" is consistent with the actual weight. As the main form of China currency, this square hole round money has been used for more than two thousand years. Why take this shape? Mainly ring-shaped, easy to carry, the square hole is not easy to rotate through the rope, which can prevent wear. Some people think that this form expresses the world outlook of ancient people. Square hole round coins in Qin Dynasty were the earliest official legal tender in the world. After Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty ascended the throne, it was urgent to open up financial resources. At the same time, counties and countries freely cast money, which leads to currency confusion and rising prices, threatening the central finance. So Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty in BC 165438 ordered the abolition of the coinage right of counties and states in the early Han Dynasty, and changed it to central unified coinage. Set up "Shanglin three officials", that is, Guan Zhong (in charge of casting money), distinguish copper (in charge of raw materials) and equal loss (in charge of making models), and form a central coin-making institution to be responsible for casting five baht money, also known as Shanglin money and three official money. The high quality of five baht money has changed the phenomenon of currency confusion, which is conducive to centralization and economic development. From Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty to the Western Han Dynasty, Xin Mang, Eastern Han Dynasty, Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties to Sui and Tang Dynasties, it lasted more than 700 years. Five baht has long been the legal tender of each dynasty. Due to the suitable weight of five baht, China's square hole round coins with "five baht" as the main form also influenced Japan, Annan, North Korea and other countries. And Thailand's monetary unit is still called "Thai baht", which is not unrelated.
2. The chaos of the new mang currency system and the appearance of fine coins.
At the end of the Western Han Dynasty, Wang Mang established a new dynasty, reformed the ancient system, and issued money indiscriminately. For example, "Daq50" is a large sum of money invested by Wang Mang to solve the economic crisis after he took office. "Spring" is a foreign word of "money". Wang Mang believes in latitude theory. After he seized the surname of Liu, he was afraid of the word "Liu", which was composed of Mao, Jin and Dao. Therefore, Qian Wenzhong used the word "spring" instead of "gold". The weight of a "Daquan Fifty" is only two and a half times that of the Western Han Dynasty, but it should be used as fifty baht. This means that every time a large amount of money is issued, it will take away 47.5 baht of wealth from the people, which will inevitably cause people's dissatisfaction, so the people still use 5 baht for transactions. Because of this, Wang Mang stipulated in the "Severe Punishment and Cool Law" that anyone who dares to hide five baht will be taken as a prisoner to guard the border. It can be seen from the chaos of the monetary system that Wang Mang's rule is unpopular and will undoubtedly collapse. In addition, there is another kind of banknote called "Knife with 5,000", which means that a banknote is 5,000 baht. Someone must die and forge such a big coin. In order to guard against theft and forge private money, in addition to the criminal law, a new coin shape was created, that is, the world's first two-color metal coin, which was formed by combining ancient knife coins with round coins. In order to prevent counterfeiting and private casting, official bank coins such as "Daquan 50" and "Daoping 5,000" are "exquisitely crafted", and this distorted style has also made future generations cry for thousands of years.