yen
Language: English
Part of speech: noun
Pronunciation: ipa: /jɛn/
rhymes: -ɛn
Forms: form: yen
Etymology: From Medhurst and Hepburn’s romanizations, under the influence of earlier Portuguese romanizations, of Japanese 圓(えん) (en, “round; a round object”) as ye or yen, now 円(えん) (en), from Chinese 銀圓 /银圆 (yínyuán, “round silver object(s), especially a piece of eight”): 銀 /银 (yín, “silver”) + 圓 /圆 (yuán, “circular, round; yuan, yen, dollar”). Cognate with Chinese 元 (yuán, “monetary unit, especially RMB”) and Korean 원 (won, “North or South Korean won”). Doublet of won and yuan.
Senses: examples: text: Passing by those clauses of it which demand no notice, we arrive at that which provides that "each proposal (for purchase) must state the price per picul of rice in gold yen." But why in gold yen, a coin as yet so scarce as to be almost beyond the ken of the foreign merchant?
ref: 1872 February 24, “The Export of Rice”, in The Japan Weekly Mail: A Political, Commercial, and Literary Journal, volume III, number 8, Yokohama: ジャパンメール新聞社 [Japan Meru Shinbunsha], →OCLC, page 95, column 1:
english: Japan Meru Shinbunsha
translation: Japan Meru Shinbunsha
text: Does any one however believe that Japan's glorious achievements would have been possible, if the Government of that country had merely poured money like water on its standing battalions, unaugmented by reserves, and the magnificent spirit of every man, woman and child in that country had not been behind the Army to support it? Japan's ordinary budget for the Army is only about 37.3 millions yen, or a little under six crores of rupees.
ref: 1906 March 28, G[opal] K[rishna] Gokhale, “Budget Speech, 1906”, in Speeches of the Honourable Mr. G. K. Gokhale, C.I.E., Madras: Published by G[anapathi] A[graharam] Natesan & Co., Esplanade, published [1908], →OCLC, pages 171–172:
text: Taking the cue from his neighbours, Paul fed three 1000 yen notes into a machine beside the TV screen and the silent screen immediately exploded into a kaleidoscope of colours and instructions in Japanese below at least twenty pictures of sexy girls. […] Paul hesitated staring intently at the screen and the waiting girl while the 3,000 yen he had fed into the machine steadily dwindled at the rate of 50 yen a minute.
ref: 2011, Rei Kimura, chapter 7, in Japanese Orchid, [Bangkok?]: Bangkok Books, →ISBN, page 38:
text: Micron said in a statement that it would bring extreme ultraviolet (EUV) technology to Japan, becoming the first semiconductor company to do so, and expected to invest up to 500 billion yen ($3.6 billion) with support from the Japanese government.
ref: 2023 May 18, Reuters, “Chipmakers look to Japan as worries about China grow”, in CNN Business:
glosses: The unit of Japanese currency (symbol: ¥) since 1871, divided into 100 sen.
examples: text: When banks lend, they create money out of nothing, without withdrawing it from other parts of the economy. This way, fiscal policy would not have crowded out private-sector activity yen by yen, as actually happened.
ref: 2003, Richard Werner, “Preface”, in Princes of the Yen: Japan’s Central Bankers and the Transformation of the Economy, Armonk, N.Y.: M. E. Sharpe, →ISBN:
glosses: A coin or note worth one yen.
Synonyms: JPY