10 Yuan Year of the Ox

China's lunar silver series has been issued annually since 1981, making the Ox one of the later entries in a now well-established cycle. The 2009 issue falls in the year corresponding to the gengyin — wait, the ji-chou year — the 26th year of the series, by which point the People's Bank had refined both the frosted relief work and the selective colorization techniques that distinguish later issues from earlier, plainer strikes.

China's silver lunar series began in 1981 with the Rooster, making 2009's Ox the fourth time the cycle had reached that sign. By this issue, the People's Bank of China had shifted toward higher-relief frosted devices with mirror fields — a production approach that makes contact marks on the fields disproportionately visible on even lightly handled examples.