Coin of the Week: Ancient Chinese Kang Xi Tong Bao

Obverse (Inscription: Kang Xi Tong Bao)

Reverse (Inscription: Currency and Issuing Mint)

 

A friend of mine, Mike, sent me pictures of four coins a neighbor had given him when he was seven. He wanted me to find out where these coins originated. That request ended up being one of the most interesting coin research projects that I’ve undertaken! So this week, I’m highlighting one of the four coins – the kang xi tong bao.

The Chinese civilization was one of the first to use money, with coins being issued as early as the 11th century BC. The tong bao (meaning “universal currency” or “circulating currency”) was introduced during the Tang Dynasty (618 – 907) to replace the wu zhu, a coin/currency that had been in circulation for approximately 700 years. The kang xi tong bao was issued by the Kangxi Emperor during the Qing Dynasty (1644 – 1911). The Kangxi Emperor was the fourth emperor of this Dynasty and reigned China from 1662-1722. Kangxi was the longest ruling Chinese emperor, reigning over 60 years.

The kang xi tong bao was minted in bronze. Considered a “cash coin” (like all tong bao coins), the value of the coin was pegged to silver as had been defined at the beginning of the Qing Dynasty. The characters on the obverse of the coin have to be read as follows: top (康 kang), bottom (熙 xi), right (通 tong) and then left (宝 bao). The top and bottom characters usually stated what “period” the coin was from, the right and left characters stated that the coin was “currency”. These coins were cast at several mints throughout China, and the obverse included the Manchu character for bao, pronounced “boo” (meaning "building" but in this case used to mean “currency” or "treasure”) on the left as well as the issuing mint on the right. This particular coin was minted at the Beijing Board of Works.

After deciphering a couple of the obverse characters (bao being the key character!), I gathered most of the details concerning this coin from a really informative website/blog run by Gary Ashkenazy. I hope you find his site as interesting as I did.

Also, if you have any coins that you would like me to research and write about, please let me know!