I recently revisited the book U.S.P.I. and was excited to see the photos of world crown-size coins. It sparked my interest in collecting them! My first goal is to collect crown-size coins from countries near the Philippines, like China and Japan. I'm thrilled because I recently found a Japanese 1 Yen silver crown-size coin that fits perfectly within my budget.
Before making the purchase, I did some quick research, and a question came to mind. I wasn't sure how to determine the year on a Japanese Yen coin because I didn't know how to read the Japanese Alphabet. Luckily, I found two helpful sites that guided me in identifying the year of the coin I wanted to buy.
Did you know that the Japanese have an intriguing coin dating system from what we're used to in most countries? In Japan, coins are dated based on the Era, named after the current ruling Monarch. The inscription on the coin shows how long the Monarch had been in power at the time of the coins minting. To determine the coin's year of minting, one needs an understanding of Japanese numerals and some arithmetic. This system started in 1871 when Japan introduced its modern currency.
Here, I want to share with you how to decode the year of a Japanese Yen coin using the coin I purchased as a model. The trick is to figure out the coin's Era, the length of the Monarch's reign written on the coin, and then add it to the first year of the Monarch's reign.
1893 1 Yen Silver Coin - Meiji Era - Small Type
The first thing to check is the Era of the coin, symbolized by two characters. At the moment, there are four different Eras to look out for. You can identify the Era by their characters, always at the beginning of the inscription; for Meiji and Taisho coins, the characters are backward.
Meiji 1868 - July 1912 明治
Taishō July 1912 - December 1926 大正
Shōwa December 1926 - January 1989 昭和
Heisei January 1989 - Now 平成
Era Characters - Meiji
Second, familiarize yourself with the 10 Japanese numerical number symbols.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
一 二 三 四 五 六 七 八 九 十
Numeric Numbers
Don't forget about these two characters as well.
元 - "First/Origin"
年 - "Year"
Year Character
Third, the reading of characters depends on the Era. Meiji and Taisho characters are from right to left. Showa and Heisei are from left to right.
Putting it all together, when examining a coin, the first thing to look at is the Era. The coin is from the Meiji Era, so we read the remaining characters from right to left. After the Era comes the number 2, and the fourth character is number 10. Number 10 always acts as a multiplier to create large numbers by multiplying it by the previous numerical value; in our case, the equivalent is 20. If there's a fifth numeric number, you add it; in our example, it's 6, so we add it to 20, making it 26, the length of the Monarch's reign. The last character always represents the word "year." When read from left to right, it reads as "year 26 of the Meiji Era." To determine the coin minting date, add 26 to 1867, the first year of the Meiji Era.
So far, only the Meiji and Taisho Eras have crown-size silver coins for circulation. Because of their design, they are very appealing, and I am looking forward to adding more of them to my collection.
Happy Collecting!
SOURCES:
Identify year of coin: Japanese coins: https://markyourcoin.weebly.com/
Reading Dates On Japanese Coins: https://www.coincommunity.com/
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