Yesterday, my grandfather gave me this old copper coin (I'm pretty sure it's Japanese; the writing looks Japanese), and he had no idea what the face value is or what year. It appears to be copper, and between a US quarter and Morgan dollar in size. It's photographed next to a Washington quarter for size reference. I also found a picture of the same coin on google, but no information on the coin itself. The reverse is rotated 180 degrees from US coins. Does anyone know what it may be? Thank you for any help!
Actually, it's Chinese. The wear on the coin and the angle of the photo make it a little difficult to identify but I'm pretty sure it is "20 cash" copper coin struck in the 33rd year of the Guangxu reign of Emperor De Zong (1875-1908) of the Qing (Ch'ing) Dynasty. Looking carefully at the top image, I can see the Chinese characters guangxu near the top rim which identifies Emperor De Zong. The four large Chinese characters in the middle of the bottom image are da qing tong bi which translates as "copper coin of the Great Qing (Dynasty)". The denomination ershi wen, meaning 20 wen or "20 cash", is written at about the 7 o'clock position. At the 3 o'clock and 9 o'clock positions are two Chinese characters which identify the year as 1907. Sometimes there is a very small Chinese character right in the middle of the four large characters. Since your coin does not have such a character I am pretty sure it was cast at the mint in Tianjin, Shandong Province. Again, the coin is definitely a "20 cash" copper coin from the Qing Dynasty. Because of the difficulty in seeing the coin clearly, however, I could be incorrect as to where it was produced. Gary
Ah, interesting! I thought it may have been Chinese, because of the dragon and what not, but some of the characters looked more Japanese to me. Sorry about the camera angle; it was done on my cell phone, and it was the best picture I could possibly take with it. Do either of you know how much it would be worth, just out of curiousity? I know that it has for sure seen better days.
