1 Chon General issue

North Korea's earliest post-partition coinage was introduced in 1959 as the country rebuilt its monetary infrastructure following the devastation of the Korean War. The chon denominations issued that year represented the first standardized coinage of the DPRK, replacing a currency system that had relied heavily on Soviet-backed occupation currency and later provisional issues.

Aluminium was the practical choice for low-denomination coinage across the Eastern Bloc during this period, and North Korea followed suit — Soviet industrial influence on the early DPRK mint is well documented.