Emperor Shuang: The counterattack started from the Gaopingling Incident Chapter 281: Rescue, currency devaluation competition among the three countries
Chapter 281: Rescue, currency devaluation competition among the three countries
When the steward saw that the person who came was a hairless eunuch, he clasped his fists and saluted, saying, "Young nobleman."
The eunuch didn't look at him seriously and just nodded in response.
The steward then said: "The common people are going to get some gold nuggets for a few distinguished guests. But what if the government knows that I don't need to use it as a hundred-dollar transaction today and blames them? The common people really can't afford it."
."
The young eunuch just said calmly: "It doesn't matter. If someone from the government comes to ask, you can tell me that the person who taught you this is Xiaohuangmen Huanggou'er, the godson of Huang Changshi in the palace. They don't dare to embarrass you anymore."
, this matter will probably pass by turning a blind eye."
The steward smiled and said, "Thank you so much, Mr. Zhonggui." When he asked someone to prepare gold grains that could be exchanged for eighty pieces of Sichuan brocade,
Wang Shen and others also clasped their fists and said, "Thank you so much for the noble man." They didn't want to suffer the disaster of harvesting a hundred dollars, but if they didn't have the help of this noble man today, they would probably have to reluctantly harvest it.
This is worth a hundred dollars, and I will suffer the same "disaster" as my ancestors did during the time of Emperor Wu.
This straight hundred and five baht coin was cast by Liu Bei. It has four Chinese characters on the front, "straight hundred" on the top and bottom, and "five baht" on the left and right. There is no text on the back.
This small coin has played a very important role in the past few years.
It not only helped Liu Bei to overcome difficulties, but also allowed Liu Bei to enjoy it and continue to cast large quantities of it. As a result, it caused great harm to Soochow and Cao Wei, and had a profound impact on the historical trend at that time.
Impact.
The so-called 100-dollar coin is actually a large denomination of money. The five-baht coin used in Chengdu at that time was nearly half smaller than the five-baht coin used during Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty. It weighed only about 2 grams and had a diameter of about 21 mm. It was called
It is called "Shu Five Baht", which means the five baht coins circulating in Shu.
Liu Ba suggested that Liu Bei mint a hundred coins, one coin is equivalent to 100 Shu five bahts, which can be regarded as an "open robbery", and the reputation of "benevolence and righteousness" accumulated over decades of wandering has been lost.
Some people may think that isn't this equivalent to issuing another 100-yuan banknote on the basis of our current one-yuan banknote? This will make it more convenient for people to trade and carry, and there seems to be nothing wrong with it!
In fact, these are two different concepts. What we are using now is paper money, which itself is almost worthless. Whether the face value is one yuan or one hundred yuan, it is guaranteed by the government's credibility and is a credit currency.
Although it has nothing to do with the face value, the total amount of banknotes issued must match the total amount of social wealth, otherwise it will easily cause inflation and the currency will depreciate.
There is a difference between the copper coins and paper money used in ancient times, because the copper coins themselves are valuable. The key to the problem here is that although the face value of the Zhibai Wu Baht coin cast by Liu Bei is a hundred times that of the Shu Five Baht, its actual weight
But it is less than a hundred times, only three times more, weighing about 6.4 grams and about 25 mm in diameter.
This means that Liu Bei relied on the force he had and used one hundred and five baht coins to buy and sell by force in the market he controlled. He had to use 6.4 grams of copper to exchange for the original 200 grams of copper in the hands of the people. In this way,
This is equivalent to exchanging thirty to forty times more materials and services from the private sector.
No wonder there are records saying that after Liu Bei issued the one hundred and five baht coins, "within a few months, the treasury was full" and the army's supply problem was solved at once. This gave Liu Bei his first taste of the benefits of casting large amounts of money.
Speaking of Dangbai Daqian, one of the major features of the money writing on the front of it is that the four characters "Zhibai" and "Wu Baht" are written in different styles. The two characters "Zhibai" written vertically are official script, while the characters "Wu Baht" written horizontally are written in official script.
"Baht" is in Xiaozhuan. What's going on? Why are there two different fonts on the same coin?
In fact, this is because Liu Bei decided in a hurry to mint one hundred and five baht coins. Because of time constraints, he could only make crude coins, so he randomly selected thicker coins from the old five-baht coins that had been circulated in Shu.
It is a kind of coin. Add the word "Zhibai" on it and start to mint money.
Therefore, the original two characters "五铢" arranged on the left and right sides of the mouth were still in the original small seal script, while the newly engraved two characters "Zhibai" in a straight line above and below the mouth were in the official script style that was popular at the time. This resulted in the same coin having two characters.
Two different calligraphy styles appeared, but they created a precedent in the history of Chinese currency that official script was used for money writing.
In addition, the use of two fonts on one coin at the same time started with the one hundred and five baht coin minted by Liu Bei, which can be regarded as a precedent.
In addition to the different fonts, another feature of Zhibai Wu Baht coins is that they come in a variety of colors. The different colors indicate that they have different copper contents.
In the 19th year of Jian'an, Liu Bei, at Liu Ba's suggestion, solved the problem of insufficient funds by casting one hundred and five baht coins. Liu Bei, who had tasted the benefits, did not just accept the benefits, but increased the amount of casting after a few years.
size and quantity.
This time it was to defeat Wu and avenge the two sworn brothers. After all, all the crudely made hundreds of coins had been issued.
The military expenses have been almost spent after fighting with Cao Cao for Hanzhong. It will take several years to accumulate farmland like Cao Wei did, but Liu Bei can't wait for revenge! So he can only use this way to make money quickly.
This trick is really useful.
The war required funds, so Liu Bei naturally thought of the hundred bucks that had helped him tide over the difficulties last time, so he began to mint them on a large scale again.
Zhuge Liang, who later accepted Liu Bei's entrustment, had no choice but to use this trick. After all, it would take some time to save up the much-needed military expenses just by relying on Shu brocade.
While he sent people to make peace with Soochow, he personally led his army to cross the Lu River south to quell the rebellion and stabilize the rear.
However, at this time, the Shu Kingdom had exhausted its financial resources. How to meet the expenses of the southern expedition? The helpless Zhuge Liang could only follow Liu Bei's example and cast hundreds of coins again.
There are two differences between the money Zhuge Liang cast this time and the one hundred coins cast by Liu Bei in order to conquer Sun Quan in the east.
First, it is about 27 mm in diameter and weighs 7 grams. It is thicker and slightly larger in size and weight. The one cast by Liu Bei is about 25 mm in diameter and weighs about 6.4 grams. This may be because Zhuge Liang thought it was used in the Kingdom of Shu.
The coin should be different from the money used to deal with Wu. Secondly, on the back of the coin, a seal character "WEI" is cast, indicating that it was minted in "Qianwei", which is different from the hundreds of coins that Liu Bei had previously minted.
After the Battle of Yiling, Zhuge Liang took the initiative to make peace. Although he eased the relationship with Soochow, Wu and Shu seemed to have returned to their previous alliance with each other to jointly fight against the powerful enemy Cao Wei in the north.
However, Liu Bei's large-scale issuance of fictitious currency, one hundred and five baht coins, in order to raise military expenditures, actually triggered an invisible currency devaluation competition between the three kingdoms of Wei, Shu and Wu. Its cruelty and lethality were no less than that of fire.
The Battle of Yiling where a company of soldiers fought, or the Battle of Chibi where a chain of ships was set on fire.
Chen Guangqin also said: "This hundred-dollar coin is used to fool the people in Shu. If we have some fine copper or copper coins in the future, we can also use it to mint this hundred-dollar coin."