Iron Dynasty

Paper money!

Pang Yukun was a little surprised when he heard the words. In the history of the Great Yu Kingdom, vouchers like banknotes have been used, and the concept of banknotes has never existed.

Xiao Ming had a hunch about Pang Yukun's reaction, and he directly used the technology spar to tell Pang Yukun what the banknote was.

There is no doubt that industry will enrich products, and at the same time, the currency that represents the flow of products will also increase. As a result, the court needs to issue currency according to the amount of private products to maintain transactions between goods.

In that case, how much should be released? Pang Yukun was a little puzzled.

The amount of issuance should not be random. In short, paper and pen are only equivalent to the previous copper coins. Too much issuance will lead to the depreciation of copper coins. Originally, one copper coin could buy one buried head, but now it takes ten copper coins to buy one steamed bun. It will cause national turmoil, so the issuance of banknotes should be equal to the current total industrial and agricultural production in Da Yu, and at the same time, in order to ensure the value of the currency itself, the currency needs to be linked to gold and silver. Xiao Ming said in a deep voice.

Although Dayu State has a tendency to surpass the West in terms of firearms, the current social system of Dayu State still has many imperfections.

Especially in the area of ​​finance, he was too far behind, so after expelling the barbarians and the country of Da Yu was basically stable, he decided to make up for the lack of this area.

And he has a big ambition, which is to establish an international monetary system dominated by the Great Yu Kingdom and to construct financial hegemony.

Although this ideal is still some distance away, preparations must be started now, and the issuance of banknotes is the current task.

Pang Yukun gradually understood under Xiao Ming's explanation. He said: If this is the case, the old minister suggested that the current Da Yu country should adopt a silver-standard currency. After all, gold is too scarce, and silver is the currency that Da Yu country has always circulated.

Xiao Ming nodded. He once wanted to establish a gold-standard currency system, but now the conditions are not met.

I mean the same thing, but it is also possible to mix gold and silver to formulate a system for the exchange of gold and silver ratios. Xiao Ming said, he was laying the backhand of the gold standard so that the gold standard could be used directly in the future.

Pang Yukun thought about it for a while and raised his last concern. He said, Your Majesty, there are many people who counterfeit banknotes. If banknotes are issued, how can we stop them?

If you don’t have a diamond, you can’t do porcelain work. Xiao Ming dares to issue banknotes. Naturally, Da Yu can realize the technology of printing money, so he said: “You don’t have to worry about this. I have a solution.”

Pang Yukun nodded, Since this is the case, the old minister will go back and deal with the Cao's bank first.

After that, Pang Yukun bowed and turned to leave.

Watching Pang Yukun leave, Xiao Ming called out the information in the technology spar. Issuing banknotes was not an easy task, so he naturally did not dare to mess around.

The reason why it is on the agenda now is that on the one hand, the Cao family bank has been uprooted, and on the other hand, the quality of the banknotes he is confident to issue is hard enough.

Generally speaking, banknotes have high requirements for paper, and ordinary paper must not be used. After all, this type of paper can easily be damaged by soaking in water.

Therefore, the real paper used for banknotes is banknote paper, which is made of cotton linters.

This kind of cotton linters is also called cotton linters. After ginning, there are still short fibers left on the cotton seeds. These short fibers are peeled off with a linting machine, which is cotton linters.

Because of the complex collection process, short lint can be much more valuable than normal papermaking raw materials.

It is only the first step to have the material, and the second thing to master is the raw material formula of this paper, which is produced in strict proportions.

In this way, the resulting paper is smooth and delicate in texture, tough and resistant to folding. Holding the banknote paper in the hand shakes in the air, or holding the two ends of the banknote in both hands and pulling loosely and tightly, or flicking the paper with fingers The surface will emit a clear and crisp sound.

Relatively speaking, the raw materials of ordinary printing paper are mostly straw, straw, etc. The texture of this type of paper is soft and rough, with insufficient toughness and tension, and it is very easy to break. If it is shaken in the air, the sound will be dull.

Therefore, it is only because of the manufacturing level of this banknote that the merchants of the Great Yu country cannot imitate it. After all, the cost of imitation will be very high.

In addition, he has another anti-counterfeiting magic weapon is the watermark.

Watermarking is an ancient anti-counterfeiting method, and his country was the first country to master the technology of watermarking in ancient times.

At that time, the paper curtains were woven into textures or patterns to protrude from the curtain surface. When the paper was made, the density of the pulp here was different, and there were bright and alternate patterns in the light perspective, thus forming a watermark.

In the Tang Dynasty, there was Yanbojian watermark paper, and in the late Qing Dynasty, it was even more watermarked with the words Wang Liuji. In Europe, watermarks were used on Saxony banknotes issued by Prussia in 1772, and the use of watermarks has become more common since then.

In addition to these two items, the third money printing technology that Da Yuguo can achieve is letterpress printing, which uses raised patterns.

As a result, the surface of the banknote will become convex and concave, and the last thing is the printed pigment, the mineral pigment.

Compared with vegetable pigments, the colors of various paintings painted by mineral pigments remain unchanged for thousands of years without fading.

Thinking of this, Xiao Ming said to Qian Dafu, Now follow me to the printing workshop.

Yes, Your Majesty. Qian Dafu responded and went out to prepare.

At this time, Xiao Ming picked up the pen and recorded the key technologies. Next, he will recruit technical backbones to build a banknote workshop.

This workshop will be a high-level secret of the Great Yu Kingdom, and the method of printing money will be a secret among secrets.

After writing, Xiao Ming got up and went to the printing workshop, which has always been run by the newspaper, and he directly asked Fan Zeng to select some people with clean backgrounds from it.

At the same time, he was instructed to set up a workshop from papermaking to printing in accordance with the printing procedures of the newspaper.

And he concentrated the selected people to Qingzhou University.

Because the issuance of banknotes this time is very important, Xiao Ming asked the government to prepare a non-disclosure agreement for each of them and signed the agreement. They will strictly keep the secrets of the banknote printing workshop. Once violated, they will violate the Dayu State Confidentiality Act. .

The craftsmen selected by Fan Zeng are all people who have lived in Qingzhou City for generations. The information about the generations is very clear, and the entire family also lives in Qingzhou City.

Such craftsmen are very safe for Xiao Ming, because they have a lot of scruples and the probability of being bought is very low.

In the next few days, Xiao Ming gave them the core technology of printing money. Of course, the procedures were separate, and each craftsman could only master part of it.

At the same time, he also instructed the equipment company to manufacture a sawtooth flossing machine. With the current industrial capacity, this kind of machine is not a problem.