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Message:: [QUOTE="satootoko, post: 53597, member: 669"]Hi Rick.  As Notoco said,  early in the Showa era they did change the legends from the traditional Asian language right-to-left, to the western style left-to-right.  You will notice that the characters "Dai Ni Hon" ("Great Japan") and the denomination also reversed directions. However, that has nothing to do with any "change" from sen to yen.  When the Meiji Emperor introduced modern cast coinage in the third year of his reign (1870), the new denominations of yen, sen and rin were also created, with the yen equal to 100 sen and 1,000 rin.  At that time the yen was roughly equivalent to a U.S. dollar, both in silver weight and trade value. 1 Rin coins were last minted for circulation in 1884, and 5 Rin cons were only minted from 1916-19. The close of World War II brought the end of Sen denomination coins, except for 50 Sen, which continued to be minted until 1948, and could still be found in circulation in 1954 when I first went to Japan. Prior to World War II gold ¥5 and ¥10 coins were the largest denominations in circulation.  Since then the ¥50, ¥100 and ¥500 coins have come along; with ¥1,000 and ¥5,000 circulating commemoratives appearing since 1964. Non-circulating commemorative and proof coins in ¥10,000, ¥50,000 and ¥100,000 denominations have also been issued.[/QUOTE]