Money is the product of commodity exchange. At the end of primitive society, the earliest currency was physical currency. Generally speaking, nomadic people use livestock and hides to realize the function of money, while agricultural people use grains, fabrics, farm tools, pottery, seashells, pearls and jade as the earliest physical money. According to archaeological excavations, a large number of pottery pots were unearthed as sacrificial objects in late Neolithic sites such as Banpo. Dawenkou culture buried a large number of pig heads and jawbones, indicating that pigs and pottery had played the role of monetary wealth in the late primitive society.

But as we all know, the physical currency that was widely circulated in ancient times was a "shell". Because as physical currency, cattle, sheep, pigs and other livestock are inseparable, grains will rot, pearls and jade are too few, and knives and shovels are heavy, so they are finally concentrated on seashells as physical currency. Seashells can be used as neck ornaments, which are valuable and easy to carry and count, so they have been selected as the main currency in the long-term commodity exchange. In the archaeological excavation, a large number of natural shellfish were unearthed from the sites of Xia and Shang Dynasties, and shellfish were used as physical currency until the Spring and Autumn Period.

The development of money:

The earliest currency in China was the Northern Dynasty currency which began in Shang Dynasty. With the expansion of commodity exchange, more and more coins are in circulation. Due to the limited resources of natural shellfish, it is not enough for application, so imitation shellfish appeared. The original imitation shells were stone shells, bone shells and pottery shells, and later they were made of copper, that is, copper shells.

The appearance of copper coins brought ancient money into a new era, and its development and wide circulation was a major turning point in the development of early money. At this time, there are mainly four kinds of currency in circulation-cloth money, knife money, ring money and ant nose money.

In 22 1 BC, Qin Shihuang unified China, and then implemented a series of measures to consolidate feudal centralization, and unified currency was one of them. It is stipulated that a unified currency be used throughout the country. The unified currency is divided into gold coins and copper coins. Gold is the upper currency and copper coins are the lower currency. It is used piece by piece. The word "half two" is cast on the face of the coin, indicating that each piece weighs half two, which is called half two in history. Other property is prohibited from circulating as money.

Extended data:

Currency classification:

1, currency in circulation

This is a coin in the original sense, and the purpose of issuing it is to "circulate".

Step 2 collect coins

The purpose of collecting coins is not to serve the "circulation", but to serve the "collection" of coins, which are usually sold by sovereign issuers at a price higher or much higher than the face value.

3. Investment currency

The purpose of issuing investment coins is neither "circulation" in the usual sense, nor "collection" in the conventional sense, but preservation and appreciation. Investment coins are coin-shaped metal ingots made of high-purity (generally above 99.9%) precious metals (silver, gold, platinum, palladium) with a fixed weight (e.g. 1/4 oz, 1/2 oz, 1 oz).

References:

Baidu encyclopedia-currency