Hello Silver & Gold stackers! Another week and I have another Japanese coin for you!

This one is really cool.

I'll give some basic coin stats, then we'll look at both sides, and then I'll give some more general info!

Sound fun? Let's go!

Stats

Some basic coin stats for you:

• 4.95 g
• 23.5 mm diameter
• 1.04 mm thickness
• edge: reeded

and most importantly, it's 72% silver, so that means about 3.564 grams of silver. Woohoo silver!

Let's look at the coin a little more.

Front Side

The front side features a radiant sun burning in the middle with a small cherry blossom at right and left. Up top is the text dai nippon (大日本), "Great Japan", and at the bottom is the text Taishō jūnin nen (大正十二年), "Taishō 12", which means the 12th year of the Taishō era, which on the Western calendar is 1923.

The Taishō emperor was Yoshihito who reigned from 1912 to 1926, making the Taishō era fairly short. He was a sickly man and for most of his reign it was actually his son Hirohito who was in charge.

Back Side

The back features two phoenixes facing each other. As I talked about previously, the phoenix is a symbol of the Imperial house. It is a symbol that is avoided these days but one that is still seen from time to time.

Between them is the text gojū sen (五十銭), "50 sen". Above the test is a chrysanthemum flower which is the crest of the imperial family. And below is the three leafs of a paulownia branch. Traditionally it was quite an important tree in Japanese culture. These days it is used as a symbol of the prime minister.

Some more trivia for you: in the haiku world, paulownia (known as kiri in Japanese) is known as the haiku tree. This is because the leaf buds on the tree shows up in rows of 5, 7, and 5. Because haiku are so short, we usually just refer to the tree by the shorthand hito ha, "one leaf".

Sorry, I know you aren't here for haiku. Be sure to join Blockchain Poets if you want more of my haiku ramblings.

About

Prior to the hyperinflation that followed WWII, the yen was subdivided into 100 sen. The yen was roughly set to equal a dollar with the sen set to equal a cent. But after the war they decided to scrap the system and switch to only yen.

The design on this coin lasted until 1938 when the silver content of the coin was removed. The 50 sen coin itself lingered on until 1948 when the sen was discontinued.

The coin was just a hair smaller than a US quarter. Here is a photo of it laying on a quarter and then with a 20 sen on top of it.

Overall

Another excellent old Japanese coin here. This copy of it I got here is a little gunky, but that just means I didn't pay as much to pick it up. Score!

Unfortunately I think I've picked up just about all the cheap silver Japanese coins. From here they go up in price quite a bit because collectors love the first versions of these coins.

But I'll keep trying to pick more up! Let's see what I can find next!

❦

David LaSpina is an American photographer and translator lost in Japan, trying to capture the beauty of this country one photo at a time and searching for the perfect haiku.