Help in identification Oriental coin

[bart]

A member of a Flemish detector forum is already more than 4 years looking for a determination of a coin he found through metal detecting. Neighbourhood findings were 17th century until now.
weight : 3.82 grams
diameter : 2.5 cm

Can someone shine his light on this coin? Thanks in advance,
Bart

[Figleaf]

Yuan Feng (1078-1085) tung pao (clockwise from 12 o'clock).

Peter

[bart]

That's fast, Peter!
Thanks a lot!
Marcel=XP= will be glad he finally knows which coin he has!

Bart

[Pellinore]

An eleventh century Chinese coin found in Belgium? That's special!
-- Paul

[Figleaf]

Old Chinese coins get the function of talisman in due time. They accompany the Chinese as sailors, even centuries later, follow them in the kitchen of Chinese restaurants and in steamy laundry houses.

Peter

[Pellinore]

A metal detector in a restaurant kitchen has to plow through pots, pans, knives and other utensils, shoelace ringlets, mousetraps...

[Figleaf]

When you are eating Chinese, they don't cook the hard parts: amulets, key rings, spectacles, (false) dentures, other protheses etc. They throw them out for the metal detectorists, so they'll be hungry and cold and detectoring near a Chinese restaurant.

Bon appetit.

Peter

[bgriff99]

Peter, this posting did not auto-notify me.   Sorry, Remelts is mistaken on this.   It is a Japanese "Nagasaki trade cash", or boeki-sen.   Cast as export-only trade coins 1659-84, in vast quantity.   The VOC did most of the distribution, around Asia, including use for money at Batavia.  They circulated throughout the East Indies, in Vietnam and South China.  The Dutch brought back to Europe primarily high purity copper bullion from Japan, in the form of bars.   These coins contained typically 15% to 50% lead, and some iron, so were not wanted for European foundries.    Usually thought of as primarily trading in spices and porcelain, the VOC made more of their profits in moving zinc and copper around.

[Figleaf]

Thanks Bruce. A very welcome correction. As a generalist, I gladly defer to the wisdom of specialists. Anyway, I think Marcel will find your id even more attractive.

As for metals trading, I am sure you are right, but the margins on transporting silver from Asia to Europe were usually even more attractive. My understanding is that they paid for the silver in gold, profiting from the fixed relation between the price of the two, set by the emperor's household. It took centuries for the Chinese to get wise on that. The money museum had an eyeball popping collection of Japanese gold, but I remember only silver Chinese bars. Another popular metal to take home was steel, as it was taken to be stronger than European steel, therefore great for expensive swords and armour.

I believe the copper indeed came mostly from Japan, but it is only mentioned in documentation for use in the Netherlands East Indies. You would have expected a coin like this to reach the home country only around the neck or in the pocket of a sailor or returning soldier.

Peter

[bgriff99]

The matter of trading silver in Asia changed much from 1540 to 1940.     At the outset, it was all about sending European silver to China to harvest the premium paid for its trusted high fineness, whether Spanish reales or Dutch daalders into the 1600's.    Swapping gold for silver came when Japan became a big producer of metals.  When both Japan and Spain's production of silver subsided, its extraction from China began.