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OP: Why couldn’t traditional Chinese Yinpiao银票/silver drafts be forged if they were merely slips of paper? (cr大明宝钞，渐越)

Traditional Chinese yinpiao/silver drafts were paper vouchers issued by private banks starting from the Song Dynasty(960–1279). People could exchange these slips for physical silver at bank branches across the country.

Silver drafts were made in multiple copies with matching serrated seal edges. One copy went to the customer and others stayed at the bank. All edges had to fit perfectly together to withdraw silver. The unique split edge marks were almost impossible to copy.

This mechanism is known as qifeng骑缝 (split-joint seal) in China. It first originated in the Western Zhou Dynasty (1046–771 BC). The Rites of Zhou records that contracts were written on bamboo or wooden slips in duplicate. Notches and marks were carved in the middle before splitting the slips, with each party keeping one half. The two halves would be matched by their notches for verification.

During the Spring and Autumn and Warring States periods (770–221 BC), this idea evolved into hufu虎符/tiger tally tokens. A military tally was split into two pieces with identical inscriptions carved along the split edge. Troops could only be deployed if the patterns and characters on both halves perfectly aligned, serving as a metal version of the split-joint anti-counterfeiting system.

The technology matured in the Tang Dynasty (618–907). Government documents and private contracts commonly used split-joint seals stamped across the dividing line. The Chinese character "hetong合同" (contract) was written across the middle before the paper was torn apart, so the complete characters would only appear when the two halves were put together. This split-coupon system was later adopted for Song Dynasty (960–1279) jiaozi paper money and yinpiao/silver drafts of the Ming and Qing dynasties (1368–1912).

Official Song dynasty paper money (Jiaozi交子) was abolished in 1107. Private silver drafts issued by Qing-era piaohao票行 (ancient exchange banks) vanished completely in 1951, hit hard by modern banks and currency reforms. Nowadays silver drafts no longer circulate as currency. Their collectible value depends on their rarity and physical condition.

Split-joint seals (骑缝章qifengzhang)are still widely used on important paper documents in modern China, an anti-tampering technique passed down from ancient times. They are applied across the edge of multi-page contracts, bidding documents and official archives. If any page is removed or replaced, the broken seal pattern can prove the file has been altered.

ariaste

OMG I got so excited about this because they used a really similar (though far less refined) version of this for contracts in the European medieval period!

First they were called "chirographs", but later the word "indenture" (in its earliest meaning as just a legal document of any kind between two people) came to be used, originating from the practice of a contract being written twice on a single piece of parchment and then cut in half with serrated edges (as in dent, "teeth" -> indents -> indenture) in order for each party to take one half, so they could later piece them together and verify that there had been no forgery -- same as the Chinese silver drafts!

(Charter of the Clerecía de Ledesma, 1252, showing the serrated indents at the top -- presumably they are cutting rather than tearing because they're using parchment, which I expect is much harder to tear than wood-pulp paper like the Chinese were using)

Delights me when human beings find similar ways to solve the same problem at two different ends of the world. <3

#china #banking #indenture

uncleclaudius

Snakes in various ancient Roman frescoes and mosaics.

#snakes #mosaic

likeniobe

A man's cap with turned up cuff, of off-white linen embroidered in a pattern of rainbows arching over clouds with rain falling, with snails and caterpillars interspersed. In blue, green, yellow, red and pink silks and silver metallic yarns.

english, late 16th century, at the cooper hewitt

siena-sevenwits

@lurking-latinist, don’t hide this in the tags!

#16th century #england #garb #rainbow

thesilicontribesman

The Pennanular Brooches of the St Ninians Isle Treasure, Early Medieval, National Museums Scotland, Edinburgh

#scotland #early medieval #metal #accessories

hildegards-abbey

Monks conferring over a vision

The 'Amesbury' Psalter, England (c. 1250-1260), All Souls College MS 6

#england #13th century #scribal

prokopetz

I was reading earlier today about how, in Scandinavian folklore, the nomenclature that's usually rendered as "ring" in modern English can variously refer to bracelets, armlets, or torcs as well as to finger rings. It's usually clear from context which is intended, though there are some legendary "rings" whose form is not specified in surviving accounts.

This ambiguity is, of course, not present in Tolkien's Lord of the Rings; though the work and its titular object are inspired by these sagas, the One Ring is clearly described as a finger ring. However, my brain has seized upon the finger-ring-or-bracelet ambiguity and spontaneously produced an anachronistic 1990s teen movie version of The Lord of the Rings in which the One "Ring" is a cursed slap bracelet.

zan-taran

This would make things harder for Frodo

premoril

Bilbo. The ring is still in your cargo pants.

contemporaryelfinchild

This is also true in Old English! The word "bēag" means a circular jewelry worn on your body, so it could be a bracelet or a ring. (Note, the word bagel is related!)

In Beowulf, King Hrothgar is described as a "great giver or rings". The giving of rings in various Germanic cultures kinda worked like this: ring is valuable and also a form of mobilary art. It is craftsmanship and wealth and thus associated with cultural clout. Someone able to give away rings this must be pretty powerful and also generous. Kings would give rings to their thanes which would confer favor and in exchange grant reciprocal loyalty.

If you are a Lord of the Rings fan, I suggest reading the wiki. Understanding this is very useful context for Tolkien's world:

This is why Sauron is a great giver of rings!

I think it's interesting that the exchange of wedding rings is the only remaining cultural practice descending from this (that I know of)

#germany #tolkien #accessories #metal

twintailedsiren

Winged two tailed siren in the sky. Woodcut, Venice, 1537. From the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.

A Venetian woodcut shows a lovely example of the two tailed siren. The poet, Pietro Aretino, is shown as a shepherd, singing to the siren from the ground. The object of his affection, Angela Serena, is an ethereal winged siren, flying in the clouds. Stars circle her, and her two tails curve gracefully around her arms. Also, this was likely a play on her last name, and the word sirena, Italian for siren. While Aretino was notorious in the Renaissance for writing erotica, his verse to Angela is quite lovely:

“It is thanks to you, stars, that the lofty spheres, called the heavenly Sirens, not only granted her their name itself as an agreeable title, with beautiful proud notes; they even imprinted the sound of their perfect true harmonies on her clear and neat voice, with sublime sweetness, so that she speaks almost in the language of angels.”

Unfortunately, as Angela was married, this poem and woodcut caused her a great deal of issues.

In ancient Greek art, sirens are usually shown with bird bodies, and the Scythian ancestral goddess, who likely influenced two tailed siren imagery, is sometimes shown with wings.

Compare this poem with Petrach's Rime sparse, who also wrote verse about a woman, likening her to a siren.

Sources

For the poem, see pages 143-144: Calogero, Elena Laura. ""Sweet Alluring Harmony": Heavenly and Earthly Sirens in Sixteenth- and Seventeenth Century Literary and Visual Culture." In Music of the Sirens, edited by Inna Naroditskaya and Linda Phyllis Austern, 140-75. Bloomington and Indiana: Indiana University Press, 2006.

See also, the MET website:

gunhilde

Socks found in the Northern Necropolis of Antinoe, 4th-6th century AD, on display at the Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Firenze.

thejoyofseax

Sausage Making with Daniel Serra

Daniel Serra is one of the authors of An Early Meal – a Viking Age Cookbook & Culinary Odyssey. He was running a sausage-making workshop at the Boyne Valley Viking Experience, so I found it absolutely necessary to go.

These Viking things are interesting, but they never quite grab me. Too much focus on fighting (which then looks unsafe from the SCA point of view), and less on day-to-day life, although I have to say there were some very nice cooking setups at this one. There were many stalls - about 60% jewellery - from which I bought a few odds and ends of things; some nice S-hooks for my camp kitchen, a ladle and some other bits. I thought about wearing garb, but didn't, and didn't really miss it.

Anyway. The sausage making included everything except preparing the intestine. We started with chopping the meat - 2 parts beef, 2 parts pork, and 1 part cold-smoked bacon. This was reduced to pea-sized bits, and since there were about ten people working on it, and only a couple of kilos of meat, it was quickly enough done.

The meat was then mixed together, and pounded. This is a process that has largely been lost from modern cookery, I think - we've replaced it with mincing (grinding, in American English), which doesn't do quite the same thing. Many of the Arabic recipes I've worked with have included instructions to pound the meat, and it really does make a difference both in texture and taste; pounded meat takes on the flavour of vegetables, herbs and spices better.

We then added flavourings - mustard, prepared the previous day, in one batch, and wild garlic, juniper and thyme in the other. Also a little water, which adds overall coherency, and helps steam the sausages from inside a little in cooking. These were mixed in by hand. Notably, we didn't add any salt.

The final step was to stuff the actual sausages. Daniel had gotten hold of far more intestine than was needed, so we cut bits off at about 60cm lengths. He had a bunch of little horn tools - essentially funnels - which were segments of cow horn, narrower at one end. These apparently turn up in Swedish flea markets all the time. You put the intestine over the narrow end, hold it in place, and stuff the meat in through the wider end. Some were wider at the narrow end than others, and I think the optimal width there is probably about 12-15mm; the intestine otherwise tends to slide off.

The most effective way to make sure the intestine is not tangled is to blow into the wide end of the horn once it's on; this puffs out the intestine like a balloon, and provides a very amusing short squeaky noise as air comes out the other end.

We then stuffed meat through the horn segments and into the sausages. This was remarkably easy, in the end; the intestine is strong stuff, and deals pretty well with being manipulated. There were more issues with it sliding off the horn device than anything else. The end result was a neat pile of sausages.

Daniel reckoned these were either boiled (with a reference to "kettle-worms" in one saga) or grilled, rather than fried. These examples were boiled, and came out very well.

Someone noted that sausages were a particularly useful way of providing meat to people who didn't have many teeth (yet, for children, or still, for older people). Daniel also said that these sausages could be smoked to preserve them.

There were a few other interesting bits of conversation about other cookery topics, of course, but I'll note and credit those when they arise in other posts. It was an excellent day.

#viking age #food #lough devnaree

memories-of-ancients

Mosaic depicting Herakles drinking with Dionysos, Roman, 3rd century AD

from The Princeton University Art Museum

#3rd century #roman #mosaic

blondebrainpowered

Mouse Armor by Jeff de Boer

Etsy Mouse armor necklace and earrings available as well as other work by Jeff de Boor.

#armour

gummi-stims

Moving medieval manuscript art!

cuties-in-codices

more medieval manuscript repairs

all from a miscellany containg thomas de chabham's "summa poenitentialis", southern germany (?), first half of the 13th c.

source: Basel, Universitätsbibl., B X 1, fol. 56r, 67r, and 71r

#scribal #fibre #13th century

boylerpf

This lavishly decorated piece is a Byzantine bracelet dating from the 6th century. The Byzantines created complex and precious pieces, such as this bracelet, which is encrusted with expensive gemstones and pearls, demonstrating the wealth of the Byzantine empire.

The openwork technique, also called Opus interrasile (meaning ‘to scrape in between), is done by punching or piercing holes in the metal with a chisel or other sharp tool, resembling delicate, lace-like patterns.

Private Collection, North America

#jewellery #byzantine #6th century