tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2288288982015628561.post7788028123214209467..comments2023-07-05T09:45:10.360-07:00Comments on Info on Modern Chinese Numismatic Coins and Medals: Medals Made from Hand-Engraved Dies at Shanghai MintFrankhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17419494224271595826noreply@blogger.comBlogger15125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2288288982015628561.post-12147737375644920322018-10-05T10:37:09.303-07:002018-10-05T10:37:09.303-07:00You can post them here: http://china-mint.info/for...You can post them here: http://china-mint.info/forum/Frankhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17419494224271595826noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2288288982015628561.post-83659103778523625922018-10-05T09:23:38.626-07:002018-10-05T09:23:38.626-07:00I have some Chinese coins I would like to ask you ...I have some Chinese coins I would like to ask you about. However I cannot figure out how to post a picture of them...Chrishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07341994064247105586noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2288288982015628561.post-12057913460631647332016-02-11T05:29:51.857-08:002016-02-11T05:29:51.857-08:00this article is very good
Uang KUno Bergambar So...this article is very good <br /><a href="http://kataloguangkuno.blogspot.com/2015/05/uang-kuno-seri-soekarno-tahun-1960-dan.html" title="Katalog Uang Kuno" rel="nofollow"> Uang KUno Bergambar Soekarno </a>banggarsahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18291955689895956048noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2288288982015628561.post-13566570837594815972015-06-11T12:08:51.867-07:002015-06-11T12:08:51.867-07:00I look forward to learning about the large copper ...I look forward to learning about the large copper coins that are hand engraved, so thanks in advance for sharing that information!badonhttps://forum.coincompendium.com/index.phpnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2288288982015628561.post-10894094037022353372015-06-02T00:58:56.646-07:002015-06-02T00:58:56.646-07:00Excellent information, thank you. I received a sim...Excellent information, thank you. I received a similar explanation from ggoodluck2013 when he described that the 1982 design is completely unrelated to the hand engraved design by Yi Shizhong. <br /><br />I'm glad to hear that the plated version of the pagodas do count as hand engraved, in the opinion coming directly from the engraver, Zeng Chenghu. That will give more people the opportunity to own more affordable versions of the earliest hand engraved coins of the PRC.badonhttps://forum.coincompendium.com/index.phpnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2288288982015628561.post-29207448578819866782015-06-01T12:04:35.803-07:002015-06-01T12:04:35.803-07:00The use of the palace lantern is pretty common. On...The use of the palace lantern is pretty common. On the coin Welcome Spring, you can see the palace lantern, too. Strictly speaking the palace lantern set consists of only 6 medals, with animals on the other side. The Corner Tower and the Shanghai Scenery/palace lantern medals are not recorded anywhere, probably fantasy medals made by the mint workers.<br /><br />The Shenyang Mint palace lantern was not from the hands of Yi Shizhong. Most likely it was not hand engraved either. The designs are very different in details, with the Shenyang Mint lantern more elaborate. Also, the Shenyang Mint medal is 50 mm, while the Shanghai Mint hand engraved lantern is 27 mm. If you have a 27 mm master die, you cannot make a 50 mm medal without going through some hubbing and enlargement process, the opposite of reducing. That will disqualify it from being hand engraved, as hand engraving is defined as 1:1 between the die and the medal/coin to be made. <br /><br />The plated medals from hand engraved dies still count as hand engraved. I discussed this specifically with Zeng Chenghu. He agreed, whiling pointing out the loss of details and cameo-mirror contrast on many of them.Frankhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17419494224271595826noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2288288982015628561.post-85326893711266362552015-05-31T21:59:55.441-07:002015-05-31T21:59:55.441-07:00Since the 1982 lantern Great Wall has the same lan...Since the 1982 lantern Great Wall has the same lantern design, it is obviously intended to match with the "standard" set of lanterns, and it would naturally appeal to collectors of those sets. So, it's not part of those sets, but I would absolutely consider it part of the same "series", despite coming from a different official mint. Do you disagree? <br /><br />This kind of reminds me of the outrage some collectors had when I categorized the World Historical Figures series next to the Chinese Historical Figures. It might end up becoming a matter of personal preference as to whether a collector of one set or series will also collect a similar set or series. Peter Anthony recently mentioned in his Pricepedia that the exploitation of the panda theme at the China mints has resulted in over 600 distinct coin types that depict pandas on them! Even the most advanced collectors would be tempted dismiss a large fraction of those as "not really pandas", or whatever else, just to avoid giving themselves the daunting task of collecting them all. That's perfectly understandable!<br /><br />About your statement that the 1982 lantern Great Wall is not hand engraved, I'm curious how you came to that conclusion. Although the Great Wall side does not look hand engraved, correct me if I'm wrong, but it still appears to be using Yi Shizhong's hand engraved lantern on the lantern side. That would qualify it as "hand engraved" since the original master hub or master die was an incuse, mirror-reversed, hand engraved work of art from Yi Shizhong's own hands, with no automated machine copying that I'm aware of. Was there in fact machine copying done? Even then, it might be a "distant" hand engraved work of art, but still hand engraved.<br /><br />At LBC, the subject of hand engraving of the silver and gold plated 1984 pagodas has come up:<br /><br />https://www.livebusinesschat.com/smf/index.php?topic=5632.msg40514#msg40514<br /><br />I think those still count as hand engraved too. What do you think? Were some of these coin designs run through a computer digitization process, or perhaps a counterfeiter's design-stealing method like a sinker EDM ("spark erosion") to copy the design without using the original hand engraved artwork? That might be a step too far that could justify us deciding it's not hand engraved, but instead just a copy.badonhttps://forum.coincompendium.com/index.phpnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2288288982015628561.post-84487945976892585892015-05-26T07:09:17.489-07:002015-05-26T07:09:17.489-07:00Fang Maosen was Director of the Die Making Divisio...Fang Maosen was Director of the Die Making Division at Shanghai Mint for a long time. He retired in 2009. He hand-engraved three sides in the palace lantern set: Qilin, Lion and the Corner Tower. He is said to have hand engraved the reverse of the Guilin Scenery brass set, but this needs to be confirmed. <br /><br />The Great Wall/palace lantern does not belong to this series, and is not hand engraved. It was made by Shenyang Mint. <br /><br />It is true that nobody has a complete set of the palace lantern set with 1980. The elephant and qilin are especially elusive. So far there is only one specimen of the elephant. It is hard to find even without 1980. A senior collector in China has been trying to collect the set without 1980. He still needs the elephant to complete it. The Shanghai Scenery/palace lantern combination is also very rare. I know of only two specimens. They have not been seen on the market. I will ask for photos. <br /><br />Yi Shizhong contributed Cranes to the palace lantern set. His Moon and Flower is a superb piece of art. The set is still available once in a while in China. You can ask ggoodluck to watch for you. He has a set himself, but he wouldn't sell. <br /><br />I generally do not collect large copper medals, and so do not have enough data for the hand engraved ones. I will do some research on them when I have time, and list them here.<br />Frankhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17419494224271595826noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2288288982015628561.post-88030815606437695872015-05-24T18:33:50.867-07:002015-05-24T18:33:50.867-07:00Your close-up photos of the lion are good enough. ...Your close-up photos of the lion are good enough. I can see the evidence of hand engraving that you described. Indeed, the style of the lion is very different from the other coins, and the fact it looks so perfect that I mistook it for being machine-cut is a testament to the high skill of the engraver. No one else produced a similar design that I know of - do you know if Fang Maosen ever did any other designs like the lion, or can you think of other coins from different artists with similar style?<br /><br />The 1982 palace lantern Great Wall was not mentioned here - do you know if it was hand engraved, and who the artist was? As I understand it, the elephant was the least popular coin in the palace lantern series, and it has now become the key coin in the series, including in the restrike sets. But, I wonder if the 1982 Great Wall is even more rare than the elephant? I have seen old posts from you, fwang2450, that say no one has proven to have completed a set of the palace lanterns. Having some strange members in the set like the 1982 Great Wall could lead to premature claims to have completed a set, when at least that coin is actually still missing from the person's collection. What is the Shanghai scenery palace lantern? Is it in the Coin Compendium?<br /><br />I am thinking about maybe collecting the palace lanterns series. The goldfish are my favorite, designed and engraved by Yi Shizhong, and the fact at least one side of all of the palace lanterns were engraved by him makes the palace lantern series appeal to me for that reason only, just because I'm such a big fan of his artwork.<br /><br />Also, I'm very curious about which of the recently minted large size coins were hand engraved. I may want to add them to my private collection too.badonhttps://forum.coincompendium.com/index.phpnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2288288982015628561.post-51673543424083007872015-05-24T07:27:00.117-07:002015-05-24T07:27:00.117-07:00I updated the info. The hand engraver was Fang Mao...I updated the info. The hand engraver was Fang Maosen. Frankhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17419494224271595826noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2288288982015628561.post-59551029239635998552015-05-22T21:04:37.061-07:002015-05-22T21:04:37.061-07:00Nice to see you here, badon. Lion does have a dist...Nice to see you here, badon. Lion does have a distinct style. The reason I left a question mark for the engraver was that it needed confirmation. Some said it was engraved by Fang Maosen. Others gave different names. Someone in China is helping me find out. <br /><br />Your attention to the flat surface is to the point. I examined the flat surface of the character 福 (fortune) in the Plum, Orchid, Bamboo and Chrysanthemum set. Chisel/knife marks were visible. However, the surface on Lion is not flat. There are bumps which the original photo does not show. I just uploaded a picture showing the details at the end of the post for your reference. It is larger, but still does not do the bumps enough justice due to the lighting.<br /><br />The Palace Lantern set consists of 6 medals, with animals on the obverse. The Corner Tower actually does not belong to this set. I list it here because it is hand engraved, too. There is another medal with the lantern on the reverse, but the obverse is one of the sides from the Shanghai Scenery set. I did not list it here because Shanghai Scenery was not hand engraved.Frankhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17419494224271595826noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2288288982015628561.post-60722400384072938092015-05-22T15:40:43.304-07:002015-05-22T15:40:43.304-07:00I suspect the palace lanterns lion was not hand en...I suspect the palace lanterns lion was not hand engraved, or that the design was not entirely done with hand engraving. The reason why is because it is so flat. It is difficult to control the depth of cut with a graving tool, so hand-engraved designs never look so flat. But, modern machine-engraving works much better if the depth of cut is as consistently flat as possible. Also, the fact that the lion is much rarer than the other designs, and the fact that the engraver isn't known, leads me to believe that whoever in the class that was supposed to do it did not complete it successfully, so the design was done by machine.<br /><br />As somewhat of an embarrassment for the mint, it makes sense that fewer of them would have been struck. They may have only been struck to produce a few "complete" sets, when it became clear that all 7 designs in the set would not be finished with hand engraving, as planned.badonhttps://forum.coincompendium.com/index.phpnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2288288982015628561.post-19673644938090712542015-05-20T08:42:27.013-07:002015-05-20T08:42:27.013-07:00In fact chisels are also used in Western hand-engr...In fact chisels are also used in Western hand-engraving. See some pictures here: http://bronzemedal.blog.sohu.com/207760499.htmlFrankhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17419494224271595826noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2288288982015628561.post-40022452542313209632015-05-19T16:23:25.019-07:002015-05-19T16:23:25.019-07:00Unfortunately I do not have them all, and for what...Unfortunately I do not have them all, and for what I have, there are no duplicates to share :( Frankhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17419494224271595826noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2288288982015628561.post-11215888604264456722015-05-19T04:22:10.956-07:002015-05-19T04:22:10.956-07:00Wow, wow, wow, and wow Frank! Good stuff. Great ...Wow, wow, wow, and wow Frank! Good stuff. Great info. Beautiful art work on those medals. Can I have a few of those medals? :-) Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08908562327907203188noreply@blogger.com