Yuan-dynasty silver ingots

Timeline

1. c. 1275–1360Dadu · North ChinaThe Yuan dynasty made silver one of the primary tax media, establishing Silver Tax Bureaus to manage mining, refining, and minting. Silver ingots were cast officially or by licensed merchants, stamped with the characters "yuanbao" plus the name of the circuit or prefecture and weight (e.g., fifty-liang ingots); circulating alongside paper currency, they served large payments and treasury receipts.
2. 1360–1370Yingtian Prefecture and Suzhou · JiangnanAfter the collapse of Baochao credit in the 1360s, Jiangnan markets and Zhu Yuanzhang's military-administrative system universally priced and settled in silver ingots. Ingots of varying fineness had to be assayed and weighed by money-changers, forming a distinctive late-Yuan silver circulation order. The early Ming inherited the silver ingot system, incorporating it into tax and salary disbursement.