The other people present saw Chu Chen's expression of surprise and kept looking at this silver coin, and Zuihou even took out a magnifying glass to look at it carefully, and couldn't help but be a little curious, could it be that this silver coin is very precious?

When Chu Chen finally confirmed the authenticity of this silver coin and put down the magnifying glass in his hand, Zhao Heyan hurriedly asked, "Cousin, why have you looked at this silver coin for so long, is it rare?" ”

Chu Chen replied with a smile: "Of course it's rare, this kind of silver coin is also called "this province" silver coin, which is different from the ordinary Jing Chu Guangxu silver coin, this kind of silver coin is minted on both sides of the dragon figure on the back of the "province", which is the only example in the history of our national coinage. ”

"And after it was issued at that time, because of the difficulty of circulation, the people did not accept it, and as a result, it could only be quickly withdrawn from circulation and destroyed and recast, and there are basically very few that have survived to this day."

"That's it!"

Zhao Heyan listened to Chu Chen's explanation, took the silver coin in her hand, looked at it for a while, looked at the other silver coins next to her, and said, "Isn't this silver coin a silver coin?" The weight is about the same, how can it be difficult to circulate? ”

Chu Chen smiled and said: "This is a special situation that you don't understand at that time, just have time, I'll tell you what's going on." ”

During the Guangxu period of the Qing Dynasty, the shortage of copper raw materials since the Xianfeng Dynasty became more and more apparent, resulting in the turbulence of the exchange price of copper coinage and silver, and the rapid development of the trend of "money is expensive and silver is cheap". In the twentieth to twenty-second years of Guangxu, in only two years, the silver coin was reduced from 1,200 yuan to 840 yuan.

This situation has caused confusion and unrest in the field of circulation. So, under the auspices of Zhang Zhidong, then governor of Huguang. The Jingchu Mint minted this special silver coin with the word "Ben Province" on the back, which was used to stabilize the exchange price of money and silver in Jingchu.

At that time, it was mandatory in the form of an executive order. The newly minted "provincial" silver coin was converted into 1,000 yuan per dollar, and all local official receipts and expenditures had to use this silver coin. Merchants should pay various taxes. It is also necessary to use the exchange rate of 1,000 to 1 to convert the money to the official special institution into "provincial" silver dollars, and then pay taxes.

The main purpose of this administrative measure is to promote the stability of the price comparison among the private sector through the unified pricing of the silver dollar and the money system set by the government. However, due to the ups and downs of the price of silver and money at that time, it was not only a congenital defect of the silver and money standard currency system, but also caused by the changes in the supply and demand of silver and copper raw materials at the national and even shijie levels.

In such a situation, it is certainly not possible to enforce administrative intervention in one place and one region. So. The implementation of this decree was met with strong resistance from the people, and people used various reasons not to exchange the overvalued "provincial" silver dollar, so that this local regulation was put on hold soon after its implementation.

Speaking of this, Chu Chen said: "So under the circumstances at that time, this kind of silver dollar was recovered and melted in large quantities before it reached the hands of the common people, and even if it was retained in the world, most of it was worn or poked. Except for the current one, I haven't seen anything else until now, and I haven't heard of any of them. ”

"Cousin, that is to say. Is this coin a one-of-a-kind? ”

"Not necessarily, after all, this kind of silver coin has also been issued, and maybe there are other corners of the silver coin of this condition. However, there should be very few of them. ”

Speaking of this, Chu Chen turned his head and asked Old Lady Wen, "Grandma Wen." Was your family from Jingchu before? ”

Old Mrs. Wen was also a little stunned at this time, she didn't understand. Why is there anything precious about silver dollars, except for the different patterns on them, aren't they all the same? At most, there is a difference of dozens of dollars, can a silver dollar still be sold for tens of thousands?

Hearing Chu Chen ask her, she came back to her senses and replied, "Yes, my mother's family used to be Jing Chu's, and these silver coins were all the money I used to marry and press the bottom of the box." Let me ask you, young man, how much is this silver coin worth? ”

"This ......"

If it were someone else, Chu Chen might be able to make a little more money with peace of mind, but in the face of this face that has experienced vicissitudes, if he makes a price like he usually does in the antique business, his conscience will not be able to get over it, but if he tells the real price, I don't know if this old man can bear the trick of fate.

"Grandma Wen, this ...... I say it, you don't ......"

Before Chu Chen finished speaking, his mobile phone rang, and when he saw that it was his uncle's number, he quickly picked it up, and after a few simple words, he hung up the phone and said to Zhao Heyan: "Xiaoyan, you go and pick up your father, he is at the intersection where he came in just now." ”

When Zhao Heyan went out, Mrs. Wen said: "Young man, are you afraid that I won't be able to stand it, don't worry, for the sake of my granddaughter, I won't fall, just say it." ”

Hearing what Mrs. Wen said, Chu Chen was still a little worried, but thinking about it, they would have to face it sooner or later, so he said:

"Because this kind of silver coin has never been traded, I can only draw on the auction records of rare coins in the past according to the preciousness of this coin, and come up with a relatively average price, which should be about 800,000."

When Mrs. Wen heard the price of 800,000 yuan, she only felt that her head was blank, and she stood motionless.

Seeing this, Chu Chen hurriedly helped Mrs. Wen to sit on the stool, stroked her back again, and shouted again, and Zuihou pinched the middle of the person.

And although Wen Xuelan heard this price, she was also a little confused, but she was only fifteen or sixteen years old, and some things were still a little ignorant, in this case, her ability to bear it was undoubtedly better than her grandmother, seeing this, she couldn't care about grief, and hurriedly stepped forward and shouted to Mrs. Wen together.

After three or five minutes like this, Mrs. Wen let out a "wow" cry, complaining about herself and complaining about the injustice of fate.

When Zhao Qirui and the others walked in, when they saw this situation, they were also a little confused, didn't they say that they were buying antiques, how did they become like this?

Seeing this, Chu Chen walked up to them, said the reason with a wry smile, and then said with a long sigh: "Hey, I was also kind and almost did a bad thing, if something happened to the old man just now, I would feel guilty for the rest of my life." ”

Zhao Qirui patted him on the shoulder and said, "You didn't mean it, and now that people are fine, don't feel guilty." When you encounter this kind of thing in the future, think about it more, so that people can be mentally prepared to tell her that the situation may be better. ”

Chu Chen shook his head, he was still too young, and he was a little rough in handling things, so he had to learn the lesson of this time in the future. This is a good thing, just have a good heart, but also have the right method and timing, fully consider the actual situation and bearing ability of others, otherwise it will really become a good intention to do bad things, it will be too late to regret it.

Seeing Wen Xuelan constantly comforting Mrs. Wen, Zhao Qirui pulled Chu Chen to the courtyard and asked excitedly: "What about the "province" silver coin, show me quickly, I haven't seen it yet." ”

Taking the silver coin handed by Chu Chen, Zhao Qirui hurriedly observed it carefully, and after a long time, he breathed a sigh of relief and exclaimed: "It is indeed genuine, this kind of product without stamps and wear, even if it is not a unique product, it is rare." ”

Hearing this, Zhao Heyan asked strangely, "Is there any counterfeit in this silver coin?" ”

Chu Chen said with a smile: "How can there be no fraud, as long as you can make money, there will always be some lawbreakers who will use their brains." Not to mention the present, let's just say that in the forties of the last century, Ping Yulin, a money merchant in Shanghai, had three forgeries of this one-yuan coin. ”

"Of the three versions, the first two were scrapped because they were too clumsy. However, in the third edition, he colluded with the staff of the Mint, and in the mint, he used professional machinery and the scrap mold of Hubei Guangxu one-yuan ordinary coins to add characters to transform them, and the degree was extremely high, and it was almost possible to confuse the real with the fake. ”

However, although this kind of silver coin looks similar, there are still flaws to be found, and the word "province" on the back of the fake is slightly inconsistent with the "province" on the face of the coin, while the two "province" characters on the face and back of the genuine product are in harmony. As I said just now, there is only one version of the "provincial" silver coin, and there is no second version, and the authenticity is self-evident. ”

zuihou, Zhao Qirui also added: "Also, I have never seen a genuine product without a stamp before, and those fakes are all unstamped, so whether there is a stamp or not has also become a reference for distinguishing counterfeits at that time, but not to mention that it was at that time, even now, if you encounter a piece of silver coin in this province without a stamp, you must also be cautious." ”

"Oh, I see, I didn't expect a silver coin to have so many fakes, Dad, you still let me learn antiques, tell you, don't think! I don't want to spend all day squatting in a pile of fakes. Zhao Heyan pouted and said.

"You girl......"

Zhao Qirui still wanted to say something, but thinking about his naughty daughter, except for her mother, he really couldn't control her, so he could only say helplessly: "Forget it, you can do whatever you want, anyway, with your quiet character, don't want to learn good antiques." ”

Zhao Heyan said with a smile: "Anyway, both of you know antiques, can't you just buy antiques and find you?" One is my dad and the other is my cousin, you won't refuse, right? ”

Seeing her say this, what else could Chu Chen and Zhao Qirui say, they could only look at each other and smile helplessly.

Chu Chen and the others waited for a while, and when they saw that Old Lady Wen's mood had stabilized, they walked in together.

Mrs. Wen wiped away her tears and said apologetically, "I'm sorry for delaying your time." ”

Chu Chen hurriedly said that it didn't matter, and then Chu Chen said: "Grandma Wen, then let's sign an agreement, but I don't know how you want to pay this money, I don't know if you can write a check?" ”

"Check?"

"Yes, after all, the money adds up to more than one million, and the bank is not open today, so it is very inconvenient not to use checks, of course, you can also choose to trade tomorrow." Although Chu Chen wanted to get his hands on the things as soon as possible, he couldn't force others to trade. (To be continued......)