Month: February 2013

Coins are one of the most easily recognized symbols of prosperity and good fortune and China, being one of the first countries in the world to use coins, has a monetary history going back more than 2,500 years.

For this reason, ancient Chinese coin symbols have historically been popular for such non-currency purposes as fortune-telling, traditional Chinese medicine (TCM), the even the design of store signs and buildings.

It is not surprising then that Chinese banks also like to use ancient Chinese coin symbols in the design of their logos.

The People’s Bank of China (PBC 中国人民银行) is China’s central bank responsible for monetary policy and the regulation of financial institutions.

The bank logo, shown above, displays a simple geometric form on the left side.

This red triangular design is actually based on a very ancient Chinese form of currency known as spade money (bubi 布币).

An example of spade money used by the ancient State of Liang (400 BC – 300 BC) during the Warring States Period of the Zhou Dynasty is shown at the left.

As can be seen, the logo design is actually composed of three of these “spade” coins arranged feet-to-feet.

What is also interesting about the design is that it is in the shape of a “人”.  The interior “hole” of the logo has this same “人” shape.

The “人” resembles the Chinese character ren (人) which means “man” or “person”.  Since there are two of these “人” the meaning is “people”. “People” (renmin 人民) is the key word in the bank’s name (The People’s Bank of China) and thus the logo, in an auspicious red color, is a very clever design combining China’s ancient money heritage with the name of the bank.

When most people think of old Chinese coins they think of the traditional round bronze coin with a square hole in the middle popularly referred to as a “cash coin“.  Chinese cash coins were used for more than 2,000 years.

This cultural icon is incorporated in the logo design of a number of major banks.

The Bank of China (BOC 中国银行) is one of the big four state-owned commercial banks of China.

The bank’s logo includes the archetypal cash coin.

Instead of a simple square hole in the middle, however, the design uses a stylized version of the Chinese character zhong (中).  Zhong means “middle”, as in “middle kingdom”, and here represents the first character in the Chinese word for “China” (zhongguo 中国). This simple modification to the universally recognized cash coin symbol thus becomes the logo for the “Bank of China”.

The Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC 中国工商银行) uses a similar theme.

But in this case, the central hole of the cash coin is in the shape of the Chinese character “工”.

The character gong (工) translates as “commercial” which is part of the bank’s name.  The character also resembles a capitalized “i” in English and thus represents the word “industrial”.  The “center hole” therefore expresses the essence of the bank’s name, the “Industrial and Commercial Bank of China”.

The logo for the China Construction Bank (CCB 中国建设银行) uses not one but two Chinese cash coins.  The two coins are placed side-by-side with a slight overlap to give a three-dimensional effect.

Also, a small piece has been removed from the circular design so that the coins look like two of the English letter “C”.  The two “C’s” stand for “China Construction”.  The two attached coins in the design can be seen as a “construction” which reinforces the name, “China Construction Bank”.

The logo of the Hua Xia Bank (HXB 华夏银行) is another interesting variation of the Chinese cash coin theme.

As seen here, the “coin” is actually the white space enclosed by an auspicious red border.  A gray square in the middle helps define the white space as the cash coin.

The distinctive shape of this red border actually represents an ancient cultural artifact that was unearthed in 1971 at a site in Inner Mongolia.

The object, shown at the left, is a jade carving of a dragon from the Hongshan Culture (hongshan wenhua 红山文化) and was created some 5,000 years ago during China’s Neolithic Period (New Stone Age).

The dragon symbolizes the Chinese people and culture.

This jade carving has the distinction of being the oldest representation of a dragon ever discovered.  As such, it is considered a national treasure and is now in the collection of the National Museum of China (中国国家博物馆).

The logo of the Hua Xia Bank perhaps best represents the ancient Chinese money theme popular among Chinese banks.  Not only does it include the Chinese “cash coin” in its design but it also displays an easily recognized artifact representing China’s 5,000-year-long history.

The Tlingit (特里吉特人) are one of the Native American people that live along the southern coastal region of Alaska and western Canada.

They have long enjoyed a reputation for being skilled traders and competent warriors.  They have strikingly beautiful homes, carve large and imposing totem poles, and wear highly decorated ceremonial clothing made of bird feathers and animal pelts.

One of the most fascinating cultural traits resulting from their particular set of circumstances is that Tlingit warriors have historically worn into battle body armor made of animal skins covered with old Chinese coins.

The Tlingit believed that these old Chinese coins, made of bronze or brass and having a square hole in the middle, would provide protection from knives and bullets when fighting territorial wars against other tribes or the Russians.

Some of these historic garbs, such as the one pictured above, are now in collections of such major museums as the American Museum of Natural History in New York.

As can be seen, this moose-hide garment is covered with many old Chinese “cash” coins sewn on with sinew.

Sometimes the coins would be in chevron patterns on the chest as shown on the garment at the left.

Some warrior garments are completely covered with overlapping coins.

The Tlingit believed that the coins would provide protection from bullets.  There is some anecdotal evidence that such body armor was in fact effective in a battle with the Russians in the year 1792.  According to Russian historical accounts, “bullets were useless against the Tlingit armor”.

Of course, it may have been that the armor was more effective in terms of psychological warfare then in actually providing protection from bullets.  Russian smoothbore muskets at the time were notorious for being unreliable and inaccurate.

Besides used as armor on warriors clothing, the ancient Chinese coins were also used as decorations on Tlingit ceremonial robes and masks.

Chinese coins can be seen hanging from the top row fringe on the Gitxsan dancing cape shown at the left.  The coins made noise whenever the wearer moved.

The Chinese coins were believed to symbolize wealth from a great power in a foreign land and as such enhanced the prestige of the owner by providing proof of his success in trade.

The Tlingit body armor and ceremonial robes tended to use coins only from China’s Qing Dynasty (1644-1911).

In particular, coins cast during the reigns of the Shunzhi Emperor (顺治帝 1643-1661), the Kangxi Emperor (康熙帝 1661-1722), and the Yongzheng Emperor (雍正帝 1722-1735) were preferred because these coins tended to be larger and heavier than coins cast during the time of the Xianfeng Emperor (咸丰帝 1850-1861) and later emperors.

Most of the warrior garments in museum collections have coins with the inscription kangxi tongbao (康熙通宝) dating from the reign of the Kangxi Emperor.

The coins used to make the warrior and ceremonial garments were obtained from maritime merchants who traded the coins for Tlingit animal skins which they then exchanged with the Chinese for tea, silk and porcelain.

Old Chinese coins have historically been used for a number of purposes other than currency.  The Chinese used them as good luck charms, ground them up for use in traditional Chinese medicine, and used them to predict the future.  The Tlingit, an indigenous people living on another continent, discovered yet another use for these coins as body armor.

For additional information on ancient Chinese coins, the Tlingit and their body armor, trade between the Russians and the Tlingit, and possible evidence of a controversial theory regarding worldwide exploration by early Chinese explorers, please see an article published by Discovery News and NBC News entitled “Ancient Chinese Coin Brought Good Luck in Yukon“.

I am honored to have been interviewed for the news article because I had the rare opportunity to be the person the Canadian archaeologists contacted to identify the old Ming and Qing dynasty coins unearthed at the pre-gold rush site in the Yukon.