886 FINANCIAL REFORM AND THE ECONOMY
who established the Liao dynasty (tenth through early twelfth centuries) in
Manchuria and northeast China, because they had "enriched their country and
benefited their people" by regulating the circulation of cash.
Yu also mentioned that he had personally met some Westerners who had
recently been shipwrecked in Korea and confirmed that their country, located
in the western ocean generally to the south of the Western Region in proximity
with the southern barbarians, was using silver and copper cash as media of
exchange. Despite the garbled geographic description of the location of HoI-
land, it appears likely that these men must have been members of the shipwrecked
Dutch vessel Sparrowhawk, compatriots of Hendrik Hamel, who were detained
as prisoners from 1653 to 1668.^15 What Yu gained from this conversation and
his other research was that Korea was virtually alone in the world in its forms
of currency because "throughout the world, there is no country that can not use
cash."16
Reversion to Silk and Cloth in North China. Metallic cash disappeared from
circulation in north China during the Northern Wei dynasty (424-534) until
Emperor Hsiao-wen (r. 471-5°0) minted the T'ai-hua five-shu coin. Although
minting of this coin continued in the early sixth century, cash was not used in
some districts, and merchants often refused to accept it. Yu found corroboration
for his view about the inferiority of grain and cloth from Wang Ch'eng in the
reign of Emperor Hsiao-ming (r. 5 16-28), who stated that since silk and other
types of cloth posed serious problems as media of exchange because bolts of
cloth had to be ripped apart for small purchases, a task not easily performed and
a waste of the arduous weaving women had done to make the cloth in the first
place. Grain was also inconvenient because it required measures and scales to
test its volume and weight. Furthermore, silk and cloth were not as useful as
cash in providing relief against the vicissitudes of hunger and cold.
The situation was partially remedied when Emperor Hsiao-wen (r. 471-5°0)
minted the T'ai-hua coin and another five-shu coin to circulate with it and pro-
hibited all other previous fornlS of nonstandard, depreciated coins like the "goose-
eye cash" to restore confidence in copper cash. Unfortunately, because the five-shu
coin of the T'ai-hua period in the late fifth century was not backed by the kinds
of regulations that would guarantee its permanence (like the five-shu coin of the
Han dynasty), it circulated only in the capital. Wang recommended that in this
situation the emperor should reinstate all existing coins except the underweight
"goose eye" (ngo-yen) or "ring chisel" (huan-tso) cash as legal tender, and estab-
lish stiff penalties to stop counterfeiting and eliminate chicanery by shopkeep-
ers in the markets. I7 Tn other words, even bad cash was preferable to grain and
cloth as a medium of exchange, an argument that warmed Yu's heart.
Other Aberrations, Northern and Southern DynastiesDeflation and Copper Shortage. In south China during the period of the North-
ern and Southern dynasties currency did not disappear, but there was a serious