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 | Thursday, April 20, 2000, updated at 09:47(GMT+8) | ||||||||||||
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Rare Ancient Coins Collected in Northwest ChinaMore than 80,000 1,900-year-old coins dating back to the Eastern Han Dynasty (25-220 AD) have been collected by the Museum of Xiji County in northwest China's Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region.Chinese experts say that the coins were minted with two Chinese characters "huo" and "quan", which are the first of their kind ever discovered. The coins were cast during the reign of Wang Mang, a former minister of the Western Han Dynasty (206 BC-24 AD) who founded the short-term Xin Dynasty (8-23) before the Eastern Han Dynasty. During the period, knife-shaped and spade-shaped coins were circulated, but the most popular were round coins with inscription of "huo" and "quan". The "huo" and "quan" coins were unearthed in Ningxia's neighboring Gansu Province. The total weight is about 310 kilograms and each coin is 2.3 cm in diameter, 0.07 cm in thickness and three grams in weight. The hoarded coins had not been put into circulation, according to the archaeologists. The coins will provide valuable clues for study on the currency system in the reign of Wang Mang and development history of ancient Chinese coins.
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