1 Mithqual - Guangxu Ration coinage, with Arabic on obverse, silver

Sinkiang's ration coinage of the late Qing period was produced specifically to pay Muslim troops and laborers in the province's western districts, where Chinese-script coinage was viewed with suspicion and sometimes refused outright. The Arabic-inscribed issues were a deliberate concession to the Uyghur and Turkic-speaking populations who formed the backbone of the local garrison economy. Several mints operated intermittently across the province, producing coins of wildly inconsistent weight and fineness — the Y#3.1 variety reflects die differences tied to specific mint locations rather than any centralized standard.