What is world's oldest bronze coin? (not gold/silver)

Because free money, of any kind, is good money. I studied a hoard of Wu Zhus that was lost ca 500 AD, and 90-95% had metal clipped from them to some degree (some so much so that all that was left was the inner rim!). Some rulers and private minters saw and seized the opportunity to cast coins to appear that they had already been clipped so that they could get a higher value for them by using less metal. It usually did not work and the government died soon after.

Cast by the state of Chu during the Warring States Period. The most accurate date I have is 400-220 BC.

This coin was likely cast by the (later) state of Zhou (which evolved from the state of Jin) between 350-220 BC. This was during the Warring States period, and the Zhou Dynasty had pretty mich ceased to exist by this point.

Cast by the state of Chu during the Warring States Period. The most accurate date I have is 400-220 BC.

 

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This little 7 mm Ionian coin is my oldest, c. 400 BC.




I define a coin as a small, flattish thing produced by some governmental agency to be used as money. But that doesn't even always work.


Here's my gut reaction as to if these are coins...







YES!




NO! This is a token...wood, not issued by an "authority", not used for money.



Yes! Not metal, but all else good.



No ....uh........well, ok, let's go No. I'm giving up justifying my answers.



NO. NO. NO.




NO.





Yes!



Yes!



Uhhhhhh.........well.........uh..........

 

This does not say the value is marked on it, does it? The head of Roma on a Republican coin (or any other type) could be a "mark upon it to be of definite exchange value." In contrast, consider "hacksilber" which is chucks of silver cut from larger amounts (such as silver dinner plates or ingots). They have no "mark" to say how much they were worth. They had no particular worth. They had to be individually weighed for transactions.

Coins, in contrast, are supposed to have some particular value (although you can wonder about barbarous radiates, or about FEL TEMP REPARATIO fallen horsemen with various sizes). I can't imagine anyone defining "coin" to require the value to be explicitly stated on a coin. Most Greek silver coins do not have values explicitly on them. For modern collectors, it can be hard to distinguish an obol, trihemiobol, hemiobol, and other small denominations (say, of Cycicus) without a scale. In those cases, the marks do not distinguish the values. I have always wondered why Cyzicus did not do anything to make the types on obols and hemiobols distinguishable.


0.40 grams


0.82 grams. (The two photos are to scale.)

The former is half the value of the latter, but you would not know it from the types.
The former is a hemiobol, the latter an obol.

So, the marks do not seem to determine a definite exchange value. They do make the coin official, which means (I think) it has a definite exchange value, but what that value is need to be figured out by the users.

 

Nice ... those are some sweet examples, coin-gang (man, this is a sweet site)

Ummm but yah, I'm pretty sure that my sweet cast AE bronze babies are among the oldest bronze coins ...

Selinos & Akragas
=> 450-440 BC






... gawd they're fricken cool, eh?