NEW MONOGRAPH: BUNS OF THE SAMURI

Ted writes:

No this isn't a cooking topic but Bun is a mintmark of the Edo mint. This paper is the result of my recent coin adventure looking at an accumulation of Japanese coins and learning a bit of their history. Edo, now called Tokyo, was the capital of the Tokagawa Shoganate and was one of the places this warrier class called Samuri were used for their battle skills and later administrative skill. The relatively peaceful time after the establishment of the powerful Shoganate allowed an economic expansion which required more money. The Japanese used copies of Chinese coins and finally some native cash. After this experimentation, the long-lived Kan Ei Tsu Ho coinage was established. The meaning of the four obverse characters seems to be something like: precious currency of the era of perpetual leniency. Often, I have learned that coin titles suggest the opposite was happening during the historical time.

These coins were initially cast by private minters but finally were controlled by the Shogan's mints (maybe formally the Emperor's mints). The invention of the Kan Ei Tsu Ho design was in 1625, in the third year of the imperial era called Kan Ei. Private minting of coinage was approved to help the needs of commerce. A more consistent coinage was needed than private enterprise could produce so the government took control and started casting what is now called old Kan Ei Tsu Ho in 1636. Finally in 1668 the Old Kan Ei were replaced by the New Kan Ei.

One of the new coinage types was one with the Bun mintmark. This type was successful and the metal was plentiful. Apparently nearly 2 million Bun mintmarked coins were produced over the 16 year mintage. Although this coin seen often the mintage averages out to a bit over 100,000 coins yearly. This would be an expensive rarity if it were a U.S. coin. A lovely backstory for the Bun coinage suggests that they were made by re-purposing of a Buddhist statue that was destroyed a few years earlier. The Bun mint mark signified this use of this special metal.

Because of the Buddhist practice of placing thin squares of gold leaf on the Buddha, the coins were reputed to have a quantity of gold in them making them very desirable. Due to the special source of metal in these coins was also reputed to prevent the ill effects of tobacco when a pipe could be cast from them. Despite this special heritage, twelve other mints competed to produce coinage with different mint marks plus others without a specific mintmark. Because of the popularity of this coinage, the name continued long after the Era of Leniency ended (ca. 1675), into the eighth year of kambun for the bun mintmark (1683), and until 1868 for the Leniency Era name. The one mint nearest to the center of power, Edo, having the bun mintmark is the topic of this paper.

	NBS (coinbooks.org) Web