Item number: A3927

Year: AD 990-994

Material: Bronze

Size: 24.6 x 24.4 x 1.0 mm

Weight: 3.95 g

Provenance: Spink 2023

This coin, the “Chunhua Yuanbao,” was minted during the reign of Emperor Taizong, the second emperor of the Northern Song Dynasty, and named after his fourth era, “Chunhua.” It holds special significance as the first instance in Chinese history of “imperial calligraphy coinage,” with the characters personally written by the emperor.

During his 21-year reign, Emperor Taizong used five different era names, with “Chunhua” symbolising the “benevolent moral education of the ruler towards the people.”

The coin takes the form of the traditional square-holed cash coin characteristic of the Sinosphere. The obverse bears the inscription Chunhua Yuanbao in running script, read in clockwise order beginning from the top. The characters are relatively small. The edge of the central aperture is bevelled, so that the square hole on the reverse is smaller than that on the obverse. The reverse is plain and without inscription.

The use of “long-life coins” may derive from the custom of “birth-year coins” (benming qian): in one’s zodiac year (that is, at ages that are multiples of twelve), when one is believed to clash with the year’s animal sign, coins were dedicated at temples to seek protection and safety. Later, The Plum in the Golden Vase (Jin Ping Mei) describes a newborn wearing “a willow branch and a five-coloured cord, threaded with more than ten long-life coins”, which may be taken as a record of Ming-dynasty folk practice. From AD 1988 onward, “Chunhua Yuanbao gold coins with Buddhist images on the reverse” were unearthed at temples on Mount Wutai in Shanxi; examples in silver and copper have since also been identified. Their reverse rims occasionally bear incised marks such as “one, two, three, four”. Given their function as devotional offering coins, such marks may indicate the time or batch of dedication or deposition. At present, the earliest non-official incised or impressed marks on Chinese coins that can be traced to a specific context are widely considered to be those found on Wanli Tongbao coins used by Chinese maritime merchants in Manila in the Philippines, apparently serving as guarantees or facilitating local payment; this has been attributed to a hypothesis advanced by the sinologist Dr Bouweina.

The “Chunhua Yuanbao” coin comes in three different script styles: regular script, running script, and cursive script, all of which were personally written by Emperor Taizong. Emperor Taizong, Zhao Kuangyi, was the younger brother of Zhao Kuangyin, the founding emperor of the Song Dynasty. Due to suspicions surrounding his succession—infamously referred to as the “Candlelight and Axe Shadows” incident, implying his involvement in his brother’s death—along with several failed military campaigns against the Liao Dynasty, Taizong shifted his focus towards cultural endeavours, particularly the promotion of Confucianism.

Emperor Taizong of the Song Dynasty was renowned for his exceptional skill in calligraphy. He often gifted hand-written fans to court officials as tokens of favour. The famous Northern Song calligrapher Mi Fu praised Taizong’s artistry, saying that his regular script embodied the “True Eight Principles” (真造八法), his cursive reached “spiritual mastery” (草入三昧), his running script had no equal (行書無對), and his “flying white” strokes (飛白) were divine. The poet and former prime minister Wang Yucheng, who had praised the calligraphy on the “Chunhua Yuanbao” coin as mastering the “art of the bird-returning stroke” (盡返鵲回之法) and surpassing even “the fame of the heavenly dragon and earthly horse” (掩天龍地馬之名), continued to hold the coin dear even after being demoted from office, writing poems inspired by its inscription.

The coinage system of the Northern and Southern Song was complex. Officially circulating media included both copper and iron cash, complemented by paper money that functioned in mutual relation to them. The large-scale official adoption of iron cash was historically unprecedented in the Song, driven by shortages of copper ore and by frontier-region policies intended to prevent copper cash from flowing outward. Silver also gradually assumed an increasingly important role. Copper cash circulated in multiple nominal values, ranging from equivalents of one to ten. Coinage was cast by the various circuits according to local needs: some used only copper cash, others only iron, and others employed both. Calligraphic styles likewise varied, including regular, clerical, seal script, and “Slender Gold” script, among others. Although commonly described as “bronze”, the alloy in practice was typically a ternary mixture of copper, tin, and lead.

物件編號: A3927

年代: 公元 990-994 年

材質: 青銅

尺寸: 24.6 x 24.4 x 1.0 mm

重量: 3.95 g

來源: 斯賓克拍賣行 2023

這是北宋的第二任皇帝宋太宗，以其第四個年號「淳化」命名鑄造的「淳化元寶」，更是中國歷史上第一種皇帝親筆書寫的「御書錢」。宋太宗統治的21年間，前後使用過五個年號，「淳化」意指「君主對人民敦厚的教化」。

錢幣形制為漢文化圈傳統的方孔錢。正面錢文為行書「淳化元寶」，由上而右旋讀。字體較小。錢穿邊緣為斜面，所以錢背方穿小於正面。錢背光素無文。

淳化元寶按照書法差異，分為楷書、行書和草書三種版本，皆為太宗的親手題字。太宗趙匡義為宋朝開國皇帝趙匡胤的弟弟，由於趙匡義的繼承深陷殺害哥哥的「燭影斧聲」嫌疑，和數次北伐遼國的軍事失敗，使他轉而推行文化工作以發揚儒學為己任。

太宗的書法造詣極高，常將親手題寫的扇子發予朝臣作為禮物。北宋知名書法家米芾以「真造八法，草入三昧，行書無對，飛白入神」誇讚太宗的書法。曾任北宋宰相的詩人王禹偁，更誇讚淳化元寶的書法是「盡返鵲回之法，掩天龍地馬之名」。即便後續遭遇貶官仍隨身攜帶淳化元寶，更以此為主題作詩。

兩宋幣制複雜，正式行用的幣材便有銅鐵兩種，配合紙幣相權。鐵錢的官方廣泛採用為宋代開歷史之先，其因為銅礦的缺乏，以及於邊路防止銅錢外流。白銀則逐漸佔有重要地位。銅幣面額折一至折十不等。各路依需求各自鑄錢，有些只用銅錢，有些只用鐵錢，有些銅鐵兼用。字體則楷書、隸書、篆書、瘦金體等不一而足。幣材則多以青銅為主，實則為銅錫鉛三元合金。