ABSTRACT
DEALING IN COPPER COINS AND GOLD COINs.-Among the systems that, as monetary organs, performed effective functions during the Tokugawa period we can count several. They are the exchangehouse, the Meimoku money-lending house, the Tanomoshi-ko (Lottery Association), the pawnbroker, etc. Of these systems the exchangehouse is the oldest. In the 11th century, when Minamoto-no-Yoshiye returned in triumph to the city of Kyoto, the capital of the Empire, after his victory in the north-eastern parts of the country, the exchangehouse system already existed in Japan. People were beginning to use silver and gold coins, but the coulltry was not yet under one central government, and consequently there were different kinds of coins in circulation. Among the gold coins were the Juyei-han, the Yeijihan, the Joji-han, the Choji-kin, the Koshu-kin, the Kashu-kin, the Takenagashi-kin, etc.; and in some districts gold-dust in bags was still used as money. There was not yet any silver coins of such shapes as in the later years, and the people used flat silver plates, from which they cut off as much as was required from time to time. There were also in circulation different copper coins, such as the Yeirakusen and the Bita-sen. Exchange grew naturally out of such a variety of money. In the latter part of the Kamakura period, we find the word "exchange charge," proving that in those days exchange business was in practice, and the merchants engaged in this line of business charged a certain rate for exchanging one kind of money into another. In the Muromachi or Ashikaga period the word" wari," or discount, was used, that is, a certain rate of discount was deducted for exchanging one kind of money into another in those days. It was in the latter part of the Ashikaga period (1392-149°) that for the first time the word" wari " was applied to one-tenth rate, and was used in the calculation of exchange charge; and in later years the exchange charge itself was called wari.
