Please come up with you own alternate currencies. It can be used by OTL or ATL countries, and it must at least include a country/region name, a currency name and some background information.
Country Name:
The Lu State, or China (有魯國/華夏)
Currency Name:
Guan(貫), 1 Guan = 1000 Wen. (一貫直千文)
Currency Symbol:
An upper case "T" inside an upper case "Ω" , due to European misreading of the seal script Chinese character "泉". (
)
History of the Currency:
When the Princedom of Lu, then a Taiping subordinate, established themselves in Shandong Peninsular, they soon found out that they were in disadvantage when traders carrying ridiculously debased Qing copper coins entered rebel regions and bought up war materiel. The rebel response was to mint a heavy and very fine copper "cash" coin called Jiufu Zhongbao (九府重寶), with the unit of Wen like previous copper coins. The new coin proved surprisingly successful, and soon people started to turn in Qing coins in raw copper prices, which in turned were used to purchase materiel from Qing-held region. People were so confident in the coin that they even started to accept paper money, which unlike its Qing counterpart was fully convertible to copper coins. The Lu rebels, increasingly neo-confucian, even used their trustworthy new coin as a propaganda weapon to boost their legitimacy. The copper coin spread with the the expanding Lu Princedom.
When last Post-Qing warlord fell to the Lu Emperor in 1869, the Lu state felt reluctant to revert to a silver standard. With the help of western financial advisers, they made the far-sighted decision of adopting the gold standard. It was decided that the new Gold-based currency should worth exactly one thousand copper coins, which the country was already accustomed to, corresponding to 2.6 grams of pure gold. The unit was given a copper name, "Guan", meaning one thousand copper coins, despite being legally gold. A gold standard Guan coin was struck, but soon replaced in circulation with a silver coin and paper money, but the currency remained convertibly to gold until the 1940s.
Since then, the currency went through the European Continentals War, the post war boom, the Asian Panics, the Asian War, South America Rush, and 1980s boom, but still remained one of of the highest-valued currency in the world.
Art of the Currency:
The Jiufu Zhongbao was a traditional Chinese "cash" coin modelled after Han Dynasty Wu Zhu, and its paper version was similar to contemporary Chinese cheques.
Early silver coins the Lu State struck bore the image the gods of Happiness, Fortune and Longevity, mainly to prevent coin cutting and coin clipping.
The first Gold Standard coins and notes had a set of quite westernised designs, bearing female national personification, wreaths, coat of arms, monarch effigy, and monarch epigram. The next design was far more Sinicised, featuring ancient coinage, people and heritage sites. Designs changed with shifting ideology and aesthetics, the current circulating notes bore the image of Chinese scientific and literary figures, while the current coin set features endangered flora and fauna.
Country Name:
The Lu State, or China (有魯國/華夏)
Currency Name:
Guan(貫), 1 Guan = 1000 Wen. (一貫直千文)
Currency Symbol:
An upper case "T" inside an upper case "Ω" , due to European misreading of the seal script Chinese character "泉". (
)History of the Currency:
When the Princedom of Lu, then a Taiping subordinate, established themselves in Shandong Peninsular, they soon found out that they were in disadvantage when traders carrying ridiculously debased Qing copper coins entered rebel regions and bought up war materiel. The rebel response was to mint a heavy and very fine copper "cash" coin called Jiufu Zhongbao (九府重寶), with the unit of Wen like previous copper coins. The new coin proved surprisingly successful, and soon people started to turn in Qing coins in raw copper prices, which in turned were used to purchase materiel from Qing-held region. People were so confident in the coin that they even started to accept paper money, which unlike its Qing counterpart was fully convertible to copper coins. The Lu rebels, increasingly neo-confucian, even used their trustworthy new coin as a propaganda weapon to boost their legitimacy. The copper coin spread with the the expanding Lu Princedom.
When last Post-Qing warlord fell to the Lu Emperor in 1869, the Lu state felt reluctant to revert to a silver standard. With the help of western financial advisers, they made the far-sighted decision of adopting the gold standard. It was decided that the new Gold-based currency should worth exactly one thousand copper coins, which the country was already accustomed to, corresponding to 2.6 grams of pure gold. The unit was given a copper name, "Guan", meaning one thousand copper coins, despite being legally gold. A gold standard Guan coin was struck, but soon replaced in circulation with a silver coin and paper money, but the currency remained convertibly to gold until the 1940s.
Since then, the currency went through the European Continentals War, the post war boom, the Asian Panics, the Asian War, South America Rush, and 1980s boom, but still remained one of of the highest-valued currency in the world.
Art of the Currency:
The Jiufu Zhongbao was a traditional Chinese "cash" coin modelled after Han Dynasty Wu Zhu, and its paper version was similar to contemporary Chinese cheques.
Early silver coins the Lu State struck bore the image the gods of Happiness, Fortune and Longevity, mainly to prevent coin cutting and coin clipping.
The first Gold Standard coins and notes had a set of quite westernised designs, bearing female national personification, wreaths, coat of arms, monarch effigy, and monarch epigram. The next design was far more Sinicised, featuring ancient coinage, people and heritage sites. Designs changed with shifting ideology and aesthetics, the current circulating notes bore the image of Chinese scientific and literary figures, while the current coin set features endangered flora and fauna.