Khai Kiến Thông Bảo cash coins were struck under the authority of the Mạc lords who retreated to Cao Bằng after the Lê-Trịnh forces retook Thăng Long in 1592, effectively confining the remnant Mạc administration to the mountainous northeastern frontier. The provincial attribution to Cao Bằng reflects that political reality — these are not imperial issues in any meaningful sense, but the output of a dynasty in exile clinging to legitimacy through the familiar vocabulary of coin production. The series ran until the Mạc were finally extinguished in 1625.
Khai Kiến Thông Bảo cash coins were struck under the authority of the Mạc lords who retreated to Cao Bằng after the Lê-Trịnh forces retook Thăng Long in 1592, effectively confining the remnant Mạc administration to the mountainous northeastern frontier. The provincial attribution to Cao Bằng reflects that political reality — these are not imperial issues in any meaningful sense, but the output of a dynasty in exile clinging to legitimacy through the familiar vocabulary of coin production. The series ran until the Mạc were finally extinguished in 1625.