From ryō accounting to decimal coinage

Birth of the Yen

The yen joined a round machine-struck form to a decimal hierarchy of yen, sen, and rin.

円の誕生

表Exact obverse unavailable 裏Exact reverse unavailable

Core routes: 15
Issue studies: 12
Cleared image pairs: 10
Indexable routes: 27

Context

Historical and monetary setting

Gold, silver, and copper or bronze denominations served different roles under the new hierarchy. The silver one-yen and Trade Yen also connected Japan to foreign-trade silver.

Identification

How to classify the evidence

Verify whether a denomination was actually issued, its date range, metal role, and design generation before assigning it to a series.

Evidence boundary

What this page does not claim

The denomination hierarchy is not a claim that every authorized design circulated equally.

Decimal hierarchy

1 Yen = 100 Sen = 1,000 Rin

Legal adoption, mint production, circulation, and withdrawal of legacy media were separate events.

Gold

1 · 2 · 5 · 10 · 20 Yen

Silver

5 · 10 · 20 · 50 Sen · 1 Yen · Trade Yen

Copper / bronze

1 Rin · 1/2 · 1 · 2 Sen

Standard	Start	End	Gold definition	Silver role
old gold	1871	1897	1 yen = 1.5 g gold	Silver subsidiary denominations plus a trade-oriented one-yen silver coin
new gold	1897	—	New reduced-size gold coin standard established by the 1897 Coinage Law	Silver yen withdrawn from domestic legal-tender role; later production contexts require separate jurisdictional treatment
Trade Yen	1875	1877	—	420 grains, raised to match the United States trade-dollar weight

Continue

Related transition references

Bakumatsu and Early Meiji Coinage Foreign Silver in Japan New Currency Act of 1871 Early Meiji Gold Coinage Early Meiji Silver Coinage Early Meiji Copper and Bronze Coinage Japanese era-date guide

Evidence

Sources and scope

These links support the claims on this page. Source authority does not imply permission to republish source images.

History of Japanese Currency: Opening of the Country and Gold Outflow Bank of Japan Currency Museum

Treaty-port exchange, Mexican dollars, gold outflow, Man’en reform, transitional currency, and the 1871 decimal system.

Open source

Currency Museum FAQ Bank of Japan Currency Museum

Official explanations of legacy money and the yen, sen, and rin relationship.

Open source

Coins from the Meiji era onward Bank of Japan Currency Museum

Official museum comparison table for modern coin denominations and specifications.

Open source