It appears to be Japanese and looks like copper or brass. Its large, about 1 3/4 inches by 1 3/4 in. One side has 4 symbols and the other has about 8. I don't have the slightest clue of how old it is or if its worth anything. Help would be appreciated.
I know very little about this area but appears Chinese to me. Will wait for someone more knowledgeable to come along.
I'm not sure about age or value but I have a similar coin somewhere and if memory serves me correctly these weren't really meant for circulation but were used at funeral ceremonies or something along those lines.
I agree with the others, it is Chinese and is some sort of amulet or charm, not a circulating coin. The "obverse" which copies the format of normal coins is the side with 4 characters and is upside-down in your photo; the "reverse" with 8 characters looks nothing like actual coins. Here's your photos rearranged: The obverse should give the 2-character Emperor's reign title as the top and bottom characters; the bottom character is Zhi (healing) but I can't figure out the top one, and it might not be a real Emperor's name anyway. On the reverse, the only character I am sure of is the top one, Shun (obedience). Hopefully someone with better Chinese skills can read the inscriptions and figure out what the piece was for.
I'll try to remember to show these pics to someone while at work tomorrow. I'm currently the only one there that can't speak Chinese (Mandarin).
I showed the pics to a couple of guys and they both thought it was a circulating coin from perhaps 200-300 years ago. One of them thought it was from the Qing dynasty. One offered to show the pics to someone with more knowledge about these coins, so hopefully I can post more later.
2-300 years ago would be qing. as for circulating, perhaps it was placed in circulation at some point. however, that might not have been the initial intent
Just going by what the guys here in China told me about it. He showed pics to someone more knowledgeable of these, and was told this is a fairly common one, worth about 5 or 6 yuan, or nearly a dollar in U.S. funds. That guy also revised the age to be in the 150-200 year old range. I might have some additional info at home, but it will be a few more days until I can access my references.
