1000 Cash Yongan, small type, iron

You Zhou — centered on modern Beijing — operated as a virtually independent military governorship under the warlord Liu Rengong and his son Liu Shouguang during the chaotic collapse of Tang authority. Cut off from copper supplies and facing the economic pressures of maintaining a private army, the Liu regime struck iron cash in high denominations as a blunt fiscal tool, extracting purchasing power from a population with no alternative currency. The "small type" designation distinguishes this from the even more ambitious large-flan issues the mint produced simultaneously.