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 Replies: 7 / Views: 3,729 |
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New Member
Australia
48 Posts |
What can you guys tell me about this coin? I found it in my change and am very interested to hear it's story. Thanks in advance.  |
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Moderator
 Australia
16857 Posts |
The reign titles are those of the Shun Zhi emperor of China (ruled 1644-1661). However, this one looks like a more recent imitation. What's the diameter - I'm assuming the same as an Australian dollar coin (25m)? Genuine Shun Zhi period coins should be bigger than a $1 coin by several millimetres. This one on zeno.ru is 27mm. Even if it is genuine, it's not a rare or expensive coin, despite it's age - it's the kind of coin you'd typically find in a coin dealer's "Chinese Cash Coins $2 each" tray. Don't say "infinitely" when you mean "very"; otherwise, you'll have no word left when you want to talk about something really infinite. - C. S. Lewis
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New Member
 Australia
48 Posts |
Damn, this one's about 24 mm.
What lead you to think it was an imitation?
Edit: You also said that it was a more recent imitation. How recent is more recent? I can't really imagine people in the 1800s/1900s counterfeiting these coins if they're only worth $2 for them.
Thanks for your help.
Edited by Mitchell
05/27/2011 11:45 pm
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Moderator
Australia
16857 Posts |
The rim on early Qing cash coins is usually wider, and the "style" of the lettering looked sufficiently wrong, and similar to other recently-made small imitations. Plus, the defect on the right-side character spills out into the square hole, indicating the .
By "more recent" I meant "newer than the 1600s". Vietnamese traders often made "trade copies" of earlier coins for local use. And imitations of these are made all the time, even today, mainly for ceremonial purposes; there were 12 Qing emperors and sets of 12 emperors are now considered a "lucky" combination. This one seems to be cast, rather than machine-struck, so it's probably a pre-20th century copy.
Don't say "infinitely" when you mean "very"; otherwise, you'll have no word left when you want to talk about something really infinite. - C. S. Lewis
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New Member
United Kingdom
2 Posts |
I had been going through my own coin collection, trying to find out what country many had come from, and by coincidence this was the first topic I found, on exactly the same coin! :) I have two of these coins, one smaller than the other. Heres a pic-unfortunately I only have a mobile to use as a camera, and tried to sharpen them up as best I could  thanks for the info on the coins-i have a few including medals (eg king george coronation 1937) and notes collected, although nothing really old, a 1901 one penny and a 'half fr' 1879 swiss coin is as far back as I go (the latter in poor condition) :) *** Edited by Staff - Added image to post  *** |
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Moderator
Australia
16857 Posts |
The top coin appears to be an imitation cash, just like the other coin Mitchell just posted, here. The bubbly background on the obverse of the second coin gives this one away as a modern machine-struck imitation; the "bubbles" are an attempt to reproduce by the machine the porous sandy surface of a genuine cast cash coin. Don't say "infinitely" when you mean "very"; otherwise, you'll have no word left when you want to talk about something really infinite. - C. S. Lewis
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New Member
United Kingdom
2 Posts |
Is there an actual reference to the year of manufacture on any of these coins? They are labelled as 'chinese lucky coins' by many websites, with them perhaps being an obvious sign of wealth. I found it interesting to find out what they possibly represented (the square in the middle as the earth, the circle as heaven, etc), and that they also came in knife and key format through the ages. My coins may be from the late 90s or early 2000s, as theyve been untouched in boxes for a fair while. They are very thin, gold coloured (despite my awful photos-haha), and both have the bubbly surface, but only on one side of each. I tried to find high quality images of genuine coins online to compare with my own before, but that was very difficult when there are literally hundreds of websites selling them, no doubt there are many replicas being labelled and sold as genuine. It seems imitations of coins in general are very popular in china and often close in quality to the real thing, so perhaps rare chinese coins are often also part of that-there is a small article here with photos: http://coins.about.com/od/worldcoin...eiting-Ring/Edited by coineriffic
05/29/2011 2:28 pm
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Valued Member
Canada
480 Posts |
I agree wit Sap's comments- I became aware of this particular type of imitaion coin (rims appearing to be molten) in the late 1960's. The last 2 are charms- good luck pieces. The second one is a copy/remake of a coronation/1st year issue with the same inscriptio as your "coin"- It was probably made since the 1990s, when I became aware of this style of copy, with false casting pocks.
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Replies: 7 / Views: 3,729 |
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Posted 05/27/2011 11:35 pm
