Chop Marked Pillar Dollar

[LostDutchman]

sheesh anyone got a guess as to how many chop marks this guy has??

 

[ElleKitty]

Not nearly as many as he could have? Many coins in China were chopmarked until they literally fell into pieces. At times, the only bits of the coins you could use to identify country of origin with the very edges of the inscription.

 

Chinese like their chopmarks, they do. Such beautiful pieces of history. I'm collecting pieces that have been chopmarked.

[flbandit]

What do the chopmarks signify?

[ElleKitty]

Chopmarks are the unique, individual marks of Chinese merchants. They're a specific sort of counterstamp.

 

When Western countries began trading with China, the chinese used copper cash coins, and silver ingots called Sycee. They had never used silver coins before. In the 1700s, countries began making silver "trade dollars" for use in the east. The Chinese were skeptical about these pieces, and used chopmarks to determine how much silver was actually in each dollar. Some tried to counterfeit these pieces, or hollow them out and refill them with lead.

 

Chopmarking was the Chinese way of authenticating a coin before they accepted it or passed it on in trade. There are two types of chops, one is very small and the other is relatively large.

 

There's a great booklet on chopmarked coins written by FM Rose. It's a bit hard to get hold of, but I found my copy on ebay for $20.

[Art]

Very nice coin and a great informational post. Thanks to both of you.

[Scottishmoney]

When I was in China last year I had a chop stamp carved in jade with my name in ancient Mandarin, those are basically like a signature during that time. And still are to some extent.

[flbandit]

That's interesting! I'll have to investigate some of those!

[Scottishmoney]

These things used to sell for basically scrap, I bought mine several years ago when silver was like $4 an oz, for a mere $5. They were regarded as mutilated coins, now they have a much better collector base, maybe driven by collectors in China? I saw for myself that there is a lot of interest in numismatics in China, and because of that coins associated with it's history are appreciating considerably in value over the last 10 years. So now coins that were once regarded as damaged are now collected as historical mementos.

[ElleKitty]

If you're lucky, you can still get chopped coins for lower prices. Many collectors still don't understand chopmarks, what they signify, nor their history involved with them.

 

I find chopped coins unique, interesting, and full of International History. I've got a US Trade Dollar, a British Trade Dollar, several Spanish 8 Reales from Mexico City, several Republica Mexicana 8 Reales pieces all chopped. I'm always on the lookout for more. No coin in my small chopped collection cost more than $75.00.