北宋 中後期 銅錢의 鑄造와 流通

Abstract

During the Song Dynasty, many kinds of currency had been minted and circulated. a copper coin was one of many things to used for currency in that time, this kind of currency had held a position as the main currency. Although the role of copper coins had changed during the Northern Song Dynasty to the Southern Song Dynasty, but that maintained the role as a main used currency. The early Northern Song Dynasty was the important time when copper coins held a position as a main currency. In Five Dynasties and Ten kingdoms period, each country had minted and used their currency. On account of it, when the Northern Song Dynasty was established, several regions were using various currencies. However the Northern Song Dynasty had to concentrate on wars of unification, because of this situation the Song Dynasty only began to unify and establish the monetary system. Through the unification of the monetary system in the early Northern Song Dynasty, the middle and late Northern Song Dynasty became the time of a huge changes in minting copper coins and circulation. First at all, in the reign of Emperor ShenZong(神宗), amount of minting increased 3 million coins(貫) for a year, but in fact there were imaginary numbers of minting amount in that time. it was because the Northern Song Dynasty minted a kind of ‘large face-value’ coins starting from Emperor ShenZong(神宗) period. In that time, first they minted and distribute ‘ZheErQian(折二錢)’, this coin was worth twice as much as ‘XiaoPingQian(小平錢)’. In the reign of Emperor HuiZong(徽宗), the government minted ‘DaQian(大錢)’ ; the other name is ‘DangShiQian(當十錢)’. This coin was worth ten times as ‘XiaoPingQian(小平錢)’. The value of metallic currency is assessed by the main metal it contains, but above mentioned coins didn’t follow this principles. the face-value of ‘ZheErQian(折二錢)’ and ‘DangShiQian(當十錢)’ was worth twice and ten times as much as ‘XiaoPingQian(小平錢)’, but each substantive copper weight which it contain were not equivalent to the face-values. As a result of this, it caused confusion in monetary economy. There are many reasons of minting ‘large face-value coins’, but first thing we have to consider is national finance, since the Song Dynasty had a red-ink finance structure. For eliminating financial deficit, the government of Northern Song Dynasty minted and distributed ‘large face-value coins’ that can make the most profits by investing a small amount of capital. However the solution was not helpful for removing fiscal deficit, consequentially caused more confusion of monetary system.