I open a history tutorial class in Daming

Chapter 72 Currency Murders Caused by Gold and Silver Mines

Noon the next day.

Ten minutes before one o'clock in the afternoon, all the students felt dizzy.

They entered the tutoring class space in advance.

In the seats of the lecture hall.

Ying Zheng had adapted well to the occasional early start of the tutoring class, and went straight to Zhu Yuanzhang's seat as soon as he came in.

He grabbed Lao Zhu's sleeve and asked directly:

"Is there anything else you want to say about the matter that you didn't finish talking about yesterday?"

"Zhu Yuanzhang, we are all on the same side now. I have shared all the news with you before. I'm afraid it's not very kind of you to do this."

Zhu Yuanzhang was a bit of a bad person at that time.

Even though he had considered this problem before entering the space, Zhu Yuanzhang couldn't help feeling a little nervous when Ying Zheng, who was nearly two meters tall, really hit him in the face.

In particular, not only is the opponent's height oppressive, but his aura is also extremely strong, making anyone who sees him nervous.

"Ahem, Emperor Qin Shi Huang, we are all classmates, can you please step back a little and talk nicely?"

Zhu Yuanzhang coughed twice.

Hearing that he seemed about to speak, Ying Zheng took a step back and then raised his chin towards Zhu Yuanzhang, signaling him to speak quickly.

"It's like this, there's something I haven't told you."

Zhu Yuanzhang considered for a moment, then lowered his voice, pulled Ying Zheng's ear close to him, and whispered quietly:
"You know we were in the Ming Dynasty, the tenth year of Hongwu. Biao'er was the crown prince, and we invited many great Confucian scholars to teach him. One of them was Song Lian, a leading figure in Confucianism, and Song Lian had a legitimate grandson named Song Shen."

"That's right. That Song Shen is exactly like our Mr. Song. From the name to the voice, appearance, and height, there is no difference at all. The only difference is that our Song Shen is blind, while our Mr. Song has good eyesight. There is nothing wrong with him at all."

Ying Zheng frowned and said nothing for a long time.

He was silent for a moment, then said:

"You mean, Mr. Song in the tutoring class is somewhat related to Song Shen in your class, but not exactly the same?"

Zhu Yuanzhang nodded immediately:
"Yup!"

"I noticed it at the beginning of the course, and I went to test it afterwards. Song Shen from our Ming Dynasty is also quite capable. He once studied with the most powerful physiognomist in the Ming Dynasty and even opened his third eye. So he has five disadvantages and three deficiencies in his fate. He is blind - he is really blind, otherwise he would not have failed to recognize me. He was an official in the palace before he injured his eyes."

"He thought I was doing business, so he asked me to organize an ocean-going fleet a few days ago. He also said that there was something good on the island of Japan that could make my son a noble or prime minister, so I asked him at the end of last class."

After giving a brief account of the cause and effect of the matter, Zhu Yuanzhang stopped talking and waited for Ying Zheng to figure it out himself.

Ying Zheng was indeed thinking.

In his opinion, this was definitely not a coincidence, there must be some connection between the two "Song Shen".

After attending several classes, Ying Zheng had also heard about ethics and moral principles from the mouths of these emperors in later generations. If Mr. Song was really Song Shen of the Ming Dynasty, he would not have said those treasonous words in class in front of Zhu Yuanzhang, not to mention that Zhu Yuanzhang said that Song Shen was the grandson of the prince's teacher, and he must know what the emperor looked like after he had been to the emperor.

and so……

"I will tell Zhang Liang and Liu Che about this matter. If you hear any news from Song Shen of the Ming Dynasty in the future, remember to tell us. Of course, if I have any news, I will also share it with you."

Ying Zheng did not rush to draw a conclusion. He just gave a warning and returned to his seat.

Only after he sat down did Zhu Yuanzhang finally breathe a sigh of relief.

To be honest, the emperor knows the emperor best. Emperors are all very suspicious, and Zhu Yuanzhang is undoubtedly one of the most suspicious emperors.

If you judge others by yourself, you will know that telling all the truth will reveal your true colors, and telling all lies will be easily exposed. Only half-truths, coupled with a series of perfectly executed lies, can dispel the doubts of someone like Ying Zheng.

The most important part of this half-truth is not how Zhu Yuanzhang wanted to deceive and fabricate it, but the words that the system once warned everyone.

[Please note, students, teacher Song Shen and you are not from the same world, and both sides have cognitive barriers. Please be sure to conceal your points and rewards in front of the teacher. Unless the teacher finds out, you must not tell him! Otherwise, this space will be seriously confused! ]

Zhu Yuanzhang thought this warning was really brilliant!
With the system's warning endorsement, Ying Zheng would certainly not think that Song Shen of the Ming Dynasty was the same person as their Mr. Song today. In this way, a lot of unnecessary trouble could be reduced.

"Ding-dong-"

When the class bell rang, everyone quickly returned to their seats. Although some people were still secretly observing Zhu Yuanzhang's expression, he no longer felt so uneasy now that he had concealed the truth from Ying Zheng, who had the biggest problem.

On the podium.

Song Shen came out of the office, drank a sip of water slowly, and then waved to the students below:

"Hello classmates, nice to see you again."

"What would you like to hear today, or I can see how to arrange the course content?"

After yesterday's class, Song Shen has completely started.

He realized that if he taught according to the content in the textbook, these students' grades might not be too bad, but the test questions were based on modern thinking after all. He had to first transform their thinking through such divergent courses, fill in some common sense gaps, and then improve their grades.

This time, Zhu Yuanzhang raised his hand first.

"Sir, I wanted to ask you yesterday, but I didn't have time."

"You said earlier that Japan has something better than potatoes. What is that? Is it also a high-yield crop?"

"But you also said that potatoes, corn, sweet potatoes, etc., all originated from that damned America. Japan is a poor and remote place, small in size, and surrounded by the sea. What good things can there be?"

Song Shen didn't expect that this guy was still obsessed with Japan and had to get to the bottom of it.

But it’s not incomprehensible.

He knew that the reason why Zhu banned the sea trade was because the Japanese pirates in the coastal cities could not stop despite repeated bans. No matter how many of them were Japanese and how many were Han, the coastline was so long that no matter how powerful the Ming navy was, it was impossible for it to have no loopholes. Moreover, there would always be people in the Ming Dynasty who took bribes to tip off the Japanese pirates. So Zhu was so angry that he simply banned all sea trade, cutting it off with one stroke.

The decision to ban sea trade was definitely problematic in the long run, but from Zhu Yuanzhang's perspective, there didn't seem to be any better options.

He thought about it and asked others:
"What about you guys? Do you want to hear this too?"

The people below looked at each other and either nodded decisively or remained silent. It didn't matter whether they listened or not.

People like Ying Zheng, Liu Che and others all wanted to listen. After communicating with each other just now, they had learned from Zhu Yuanzhang that Song Shen of the Ming Dynasty also believed that Japan had good things. They were all emperors who were accustomed to expanding territory, so there was no reason for them not to listen.

However, the Zhenguan Five, including Zhang Liang and Li Shimin, were more casual. Both the early Han Dynasty and the early Tang Dynasty were in a state of disrepair. Even if they knew that Japan had good things, they would not really take action to attack it in the short term. This was too big a step and could easily lead to failure.

Seeing this, Song Shen probably guessed what they were thinking.

He thought for a moment, turned on the projector, and projected a picture on it.

——Distribution map of gold and silver minerals throughout Japan.

"Although the country of Wa is not big, has many earthquakes, and has few mineral resources, it has one advantage: it is rich in gold and silver."

"Gold and silver, everyone should know what they are, do I need to say more?"

Just two sentences and eleven men will fall for you.

Just as no emperor disliked high-yield crops, no emperor disliked gold and silver mines, even if their dynasties did not use gold and silver as common currency. This was not because they did not want to, but because there were not so many precious metals to use. In fact, even in the Qin Dynasty, which used half-liang coins, gold and silver products were very valuable.

Song Shen now clearly feels that the looks from those eleven men below are enough to eat him alive!
"Cough cough cough."

He coughed twice to ease the embarrassment:
"I know. It wasn't until the Ming Dynasty that silver began to be used as a common currency on a large scale. But..."

Zhu Yuanzhang suddenly stood up and shouted:
"and many more!"

"When did the Ming Dynasty start using silver? Sir, are you mistaken? We have already started issuing treasure notes to officials a few years ago, and asked the people to exchange their gold, silver and copper coins for treasure notes. How could we use silver?"

Song Shen was stunned for a moment.

Then he laughed out loud.

"Oh, classmate Zhu Yuanzhang, don't get excited yet. Your treasure note is indeed interesting. I will tell you about it later so that everyone can learn from it. Please sit down."

Zhu Yuanzhang:?

Still taking it as a warning?
We should learn from our mistakes, isn't this treasure note good? !

His mind was full of question marks and he was feeling unhappy, but Song Shen had spoken after all, so in order to avoid violating classroom discipline he could only sit down slowly.

"Since classmate Zhu Yuanzhang brought it up, let's talk about the history of currency today."

Song Shen knocked on the table and said with a smile:

"The history of currency in our country is long, almost as long as the history of our country. In the earliest and most primitive tribes, people did not use currency to trade, but bartered. Later, bartering caused a problem, that is, some items were not needed, but the items needed had to be exchanged for other things, so the concept of currency appeared."

"In the Shang Dynasty, people used shellfish as currency, but when the amount of goods exchanged became larger, naturally occurring shellfish could no longer meet market demand, so the Shang people used copper to imitate shellfish, which was the first copper coin."

"From the appearance of copper coins in the Shang Dynasty to the end of the Warring States Period, there were various types of copper coins, such as the Zhao State's shovel coins, the Qi State's knife coins, the Qin State's round square hole coins, etc. The most famous one should be the Chu State's ant nose coins. But after Qin Shihuang unified the six kingdoms, my country's currency began to change to a fixed model, that is, the saying 'use Qin coins to be the same as the currencies of the world', making the Qin half-liang coins universally used throughout the country."

"This is a relatively important turning point, the transition from a chaotic shape to a unified shape, and the Qin Dynasty played an indispensable role in this."

Having said that, Song Shen paused.

Although Ying Zheng, who was standing below, usually did not show his emotions, when he was praised in front of a bunch of emperors in the classroom, the corners of his mouth couldn't help but slightly curl up 33.3 degrees.

Song Shen drank some water, took a breath, and then continued:

"At the beginning of the Han Dynasty, the emperor allowed the counties to mint their own coins. Emperor Wen of the Han Dynasty abolished the order to mint coins, allowing the people to mint coins freely, so counterfeiting began like a cloud. This not only caused chaos in the currency market, but also allowed wealthy merchants to control the right to mint coins, which had a very bad impact. It was not until Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, Liu Che, took back the coinage rights of the counties and states and changed the central government to print the Wuzhu coins that the Wuzhu coins became the only legal tender at that time."

"This decision by Emperor Wu of Han confirmed the unified management of coin minting and issuance by the central government. It was also a very important evolution and was very correct."

Liu Che couldn't help but curl up the corners of his mouth to 44.4 degrees, completely empathizing with Ying Zheng next to him.

Who doesn't like to be praised? If you don't like it, then it's because you haven't praised them enough, which is commonly known as "flattering the horse's hoof".

For an emperor, the greatest affirmation is the affirmation of his achievements and the correctness of his decisions. After hearing Song Shen's praise, both of them felt so proud that they wanted to fly to the sky!
But among the people present, there was one person whose face was extremely dark.

Zhu Yuanzhang just couldn't figure it out - it was clear that everyone had improved the coin, so why did they praise it when it came to Ying Zheng and Liu Che, but he had to take it as a warning when it came to his own Ming Baochao? How the hell is this reasonable, huh?!
Zhu Yuanzhang was unhappy and wanted to overturn the table, but he didn't dare to say anything.

He had his hands in his pockets and his head was steaming, just waiting for Song Shen to talk about his part.

"...During the Sui and Tang dynasties, the currency was changed again."

Song Shen continued:
"Since the Qin and Han dynasties, all coins minted had their weights marked on the coin text, such as the Qin Banliang coin and the Han Wuzhu coin we just mentioned. In the Tang Dynasty, Emperor Gaozu Li Yuan abolished the coins of previous dynasties with different weights and instead minted Kaiyuan Tongbao with the meaning of 'opening up a new yuan'. This was the earliest Tongbao coin in my country that did not measure weight, and it was also a very important breakthrough."

Li Shimin touched his nose to cover the 55.5-degree smile at the corner of his mouth.

Although this was not his achievement, but was done by his father in the fourth year of Wude, as the King of Qin at that time, Li Shimin also participated in the discussion of Kaiyuan Tongbao. In addition, it was done by his own father, so Emperor Li II could be proud of it no matter what.

In short, as long as you are no worse than the Qin Emperor and Han Emperor, that's all!
"No, sir."

Zhu Yuanzhang couldn't hold back his anger any longer, so he raised his hand and stood up:

"Why don't you tell me what's wrong with our Ming Dynasty treasure notes? You've been praising them before, but even if there are problems with the Ming Dynasty treasure notes, we are still using things from the Song and Yuan dynasties. If you want to say something, you have to point out the faults of the Song and Yuan dynasties. How can you say that we should learn from them?"

Song Shen nodded:

"Yes, everyone should be scolded, but you deserve the most."

"Haven't you experienced the period of soaring prices during the chaotic times at the end of the Yuan Dynasty? Why haven't you ever thought that the reason why things were so expensive during the Yuan Dynasty might be because they issued a large amount of paper money?"

(End of this chapter)