Indian Antiquary Vol 27

Author(s): Richard Carnac Temple
Publisher: Swati Publications

Page 33

FEBRUARY, 1898.
CURRENCY AND COINAGE AMONG THE BURMESE.
29
CURRENCY AND COINAGE AMONG THE BURMESE.
BY R. C. TEMPLE. (Continued from p. 21.)
Chinese Weights. So much is said in the course of this Chapter regarding Chinese influence on the weight system of Further India, that it is necessary to consider here the Chinese weights themselves.
Prof. Ridgeway, 15 Origin of Currency, p. 158, quoting apparently Silvestre, Excursions et Reconnaissunces, 1883, No. 15, p. 308 ff., but in reality taking the whole information from Wade, Tru Erh Chi, Vol. II. p. 213, which again is condensed from Bridgman's Chinese Chrestomatky, & book I have not seen, gives the modern indigenous table of weights thus :
10 1116 are 1 fên 10 fên
1 chilen 10 chi'en 1 liang 16 liang » 1 chin
100 chin , 1 tan or shih For the above vernacular terms read as follows, and the universal Far Eastern and Archipelagic modern commercial terminology for currency is reached, thus27:
is cash
» candareen ch'en mace liang - tael chin18
» catty 10
tan (shih), picu120 The modern scale then is practically almost antirely deoimal, the 16 liang to the chin being introduced apparently to satisfy general Far Eastern convenience commercially.21 However, when and how the modern scale came to be introduced I have no means by me of satisfactorily ascertaining, but such examination of ancient Chinese weights as I am able to make shews that it cannot have been introduced very long ago, for it certainly did not exist, according to Terrion de la Couperie, at any rate up to 621 A. D.
For, in his Catalogue of Chinese Coins, he covers the period of the VIIth Century B. C. to the VIIth Century A.D., and at pp. xliii. ff. has an elaborate disquisition on weights, based chiefly on the ancient coins still in existence, because of the muddle which the native writers on the subject have made of their identifications. His pages are rather hard and difficult reading, but after an amount of trouble that might have been avoided had the presentation been clearer, I have been able to put together the following statements from pp. xliii. and xliv. :
Ancient Chinese Weights.
A. - General Table. 1 chu
equals grs. 4-06 6 chu are 1 hwa
2 hw 1 chea , , 48.75 16 Prot. Ridgeway is a little vague in his transcriptions, 69, we have chi'en, p. 158 ch'en, p. 150, and lung, p. 158 hang, P. 158.
16 Also tung and ch'ion, Wade, Txu Erh Chi, Vol. II. p. 218.
11 Herstlett's Treaties, p. 87 n. See also Stevens, Guide, 1775, p. 91, who says that the "gross Weights differ, more or less about one per Cent" and that the "Dodging," i. &., scales, seldom agree. 1 Ungally kit.
This seems for a long while to have been fixed at li lb.; soo Stevens, Guide, A 91. * Fized at 1331 lbs. av. by Treaty of 1858: see Herstlett's Treatis, p. 83. It was reckoned at that rate in the ast Century; see Stevens, Guido, p. 91.
* The modern liang (taal), being about an or., 16 liang or ontty (chin, hins about Ib. av.
* Terrien de la Couperie is not certain to this word apparently, fær On D. zlili. he has ondored the character for this weight me to, and on p. xliv. w teha
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