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5 Yuan Canon and Gunpowder, Silver Bullion
| Issuer | People's Bank of China |
|---|---|
| Year | 1995 |
| Type | Non-circulating coin |
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| Obverse description | A detailed high-relief depiction of a section of the Great Wall of China occupies the central field, rendered with fine architectural detail including crenellated battlements, stone staircases, and rocky terrain with stylized foliage. The Chinese legend 中华人民共和国 (People's Republic of China) arcs along the upper periphery in Chinese characters. The date 1995 appears in the lower field beneath the wall design. The mirror-like proof fields provide strong contrast against the frosted devices. |
|---|---|
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| Reverse lettering | 火药 公元十一世纪 5元 |
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| Additional information |
Part of China's long-running Inventions and Discoveries bullion series, this 1995 issue commemorates two technologies — gunpowder and the cannon — whose Chinese origins were consistently downplayed in Western scholarship well into the twentieth century. The series itself was partly a deliberate cultural-diplomatic exercise, coinciding with Beijing's push through the 1990s to assert intellectual priority over inventions the industrialized world had long credited elsewhere.
The .900 fineness is atypical for Chinese silver bullion of this period; the Panda series ran at .999. That lower silver standard points to this coin being positioned more as a numismatic collectible than a pure bullion vehicle.