page_title: Zhou dynasty coinage
section_title: Spade money
hierarchical_section_title: Zhou dynasty coinage / Spade money
caption_attribution_description: English: Square Shoulder Spade coin from the State of Zhou. c. 650-400 BC. One character 貝 bei.
context_page_description: Chinese coinage during the Spring and Autumn and Warring States periods includes some of the earliest coins produced in the world. However, they were mostly not the typical round shape of modern coins. They included cowrie shells, ant nose money, spade-shaped money and knife-shaped money.
context_section_description: The shape of spade money (Chinese: 布币; pinyin: bù bì) is similar to spade, an agricultural tool. The pronunciation of "spade" in Chinese is "bo" (Chinese: 镈; pinyin: bó), which is very close to "bu" (Chinese: 布; pinyin: bù), and it is where spade money derived its name. During the Spring and Autumn period, spade money was used mainly in Shanxi and Zhou royal family. There are two primary types of spade money, Kong Shou Bu (空首布), the early one, and Ping Shou Bu (Chinese: 平首布; pinyin: Píng shǒu bù), the late one. During the currency process, each kingdom had developed their techniques for producing money with the great growth of the national economy. As a result, big changes had taken place in spade money, from big and thick one to small and thin one.
  Spade money began to be used in the Spring and Autumn period and ended in the late Warring States. Today, there are few remaining and it has become the emphasis of collectors.
  Zhongshan kingdom (Chinese: 中山国; pinyin: zhōngshān guó) (nearly in the 4th century BC), a small vassal state in the mid-Warring States period, first invented and used the early three-hole spade money (Chinese: 三孔布币; pinyin: sān kǒng bù bì), whose contour looked like a mountain. At that time, the handicraft industry, business, iron-smelting industry and bronze casting industry in that kingdom were developed. Usually, people threaded the money together through these holes, which made it easier for people to carry, more convenient for the money to circulate. As a result, the three-hole spade money was well received among people at that time. Due to continuous wars, Zhongshan kingdom fell down and most of the three-hole spade money got lost. Today, there are few left and we can hardly find even in some nationalized large-scale museums.
caption: Spade money
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