«Деньги из живота Будды» – китайские храмовые монеты периода монгольской династии Юань

Under the Yüan dynasty Buddhism was widely spread and supported by the State. Buddhist temples paid reduced taxes, were donated vast land estates and received ample financial aid from the State.

The income of religious institutions consisted to a large extent of the believers’ donations, including natural products, silver bullions, and money (both paper currency and bronze coins). The temples also turned out the so-called temple, or donation, coins that were sold to worshippers.

Official coins were normally introduced into circulation to support the paper currency after money reforms. In their design, metrological parameters and alloy composition, the coins strictly followed the standard, independent of the place of their production. Unlike the short-termed offi cial emissions, temple coins continued to be turned out throughout the whole of the Yüan period. The large number of potential emitters and the fact that emitted coins do not obey any obvious standard indicate that temple minting was not centrally regulated. The analysis of the alloys shows that temple copper foundries did not regulate the composition of the alloy, nor the technology of its refinement.

The article concludes that in spite of the support accorded to the temples by the State Yüan temple coins cannot be counted among the official coin emissions.