This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Find sources: "Chinese export silver" – news · newspapers · books · scholar · JSTOR(August 2016) (Learn how and when to remove this message)
Exhibit in the Huntington Museum of Art, Huntington, West Virginia, USA
Chinese export silver is silverware made in China for export, mainly to Europe. It is analagous to the much larger production of Chinese export porcelain, but unlike this remained largely confined to ornamental objects rather than practical tableware. In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, through the Chinese Canton System (Canton Port) and after that, the opium war, the Treaty of Nanking and Treaty of Tientsin, Qing dynasty China became a major exporter for fine Chinese goods such as tea, spices and porcelain etc. to Europe, Germany, France, Russia and America and north Africa. The Treaty trading ports were further extended throughout the entire Qing Dynasty's land.[1]
Historically, silver has been more valuable in China than Europe, relative to gold and other commodities, and European traders had for centuries paid for their purchases of Chinese goods with silver. Now for the first time, price levels made the importation of silver objects made for export to Europe attractive.[2] Though the Chinese government had for centuries been content to see renewable or inexhaustible luxury products such as silk or ceramics leave China as trade goods or diplomatic gifts, they had tried to retain as much silver as possible in China. Now they were unable to do this.
Just as the Chinese potters produced Chinese export porcelain for Western consumers,[3] Chinese silversmiths also created elaborately-decorated objects for international clients. Early works of Chinese Export Silver was intended to reproduce or copy objects in European styles. However, in copying the European style or model objects, the Chinese artisans later managed to add to new decorations such Chinese motifs as the dragon, flowers, bamboo and scenes of life at the Chinese court. Blending Western forms with Asian decoration including dragons, bamboo, and Chinese landscapes, these pieces reflect the long-standing cultural and commercial exchange between East and West.[4]
^"The Canton Trade and The Hong Merchants System". www.library.hbs.edu. Retrieved 2016-08-05.
^"1750-1919: China and the West: Imperialism, Opium, and Self-Strengthening (1800-1921) | Central Themes and Key Points | Asia for Educators | Columbia University". afe.easia.columbia.edu. Retrieved 2016-08-05.
Chineseexportsilver is silverware made in China for export, mainly to Europe. It is analagous to the much larger production of Chineseexport porcelain...
Chineseexport porcelain includes a wide range of Chinese porcelain that was made (almost) exclusively for export to Europe and later to North America...
southeast coast of China, with tacit Chinese consent. In 1540, Japanese ports became a hotspot for Chinese traders seeking to obtain silver, a precious commodity...
goods. However, exports as a percentage of GDP has steadily dropped to just around 20%, reflecting its decreasing importance to the Chinese economy. Nevertheless...
last to abandon the silver standard. In October 1934, the National Government of Republic of China increased the silver-based export duty and adjusted the...
various parts of the East Indies", despite a government ban on the export of nickel silver. It became known in the West from imported wares called baitong...
became commonly exported, first to Great Britain and then to California in the 1960s. Early varieties discovered and cultivated in China, were described...
research published by European Central Bank in 2011, the quality of Chinese products exported to EU markets is high relative to other developing economies,...
then shipped to China and sold for up to 250 times its weight in silver. Furs were the third-most lucrative American export to China. Searching for another...
Siam. Japanese merchants mainly exportedsilver, diamonds, copper, swords, and other artifacts, and imported Chinese silk as well as some Southeast Asian...
Sterling silver is an alloy composed by weight of 92.5% silver and 7.5% other metals, usually copper. The sterling silver standard has a minimum millesimal...
capital of China. This development was due to the combination of Chinese techniques and Islamic trade. The new ware was made possible by the export of cobalt...
sophisticated Chinese porcelain wares made for the imperial court and for export. Porcelain was a Chinese invention and is so identified with China that it...
to a gold exchange standard (wherein silver or banknotes circulate locally but with a fixed gold value for export purposes), including India in the 1890s...
gradually reversed, and Chinese merchants were soon exportingsilver to pay for opium rather than Europeans paying for Chinese goods with the precious...
has become a symbol for money in many Chinese and Japanese ideograms. The earliest coins to reach Japan were Chinese Ban Liang and Wu Zhu coins, as well...
profitable trade with China's hundreds of millions of consumers. It did not happen. By 1890 the total value of all Chinese imports and exports to the outer world...
Eternal Spring Silver Sprout. The Ming dynasty scholar Wen Zhenheng's encyclopedic book Zhǎng Wù Zhì (simplified Chinese: 长物志; traditional Chinese: 長物志; Treatise...
Republic of China. It is the world's 5th most traded currency as of April 2022. The yuan (Chinese: 元 or simplified Chinese: 圆; traditional Chinese: 圓; pinyin:...
The history of tea in China is long and complex, for the Chinese have enjoyed tea for millennia. Scholars hailed the brew as a cure for a variety of ailments;...
imperial Chinese administration suspected that more silver was being exported than imported causing the Chinese to slowly develop a silver deficit as...
Mexican peso after 1821, however, increased the latter's silver content to 24.44 g and reduced the export demand for U.S. dollars. Before the American Revolution...
retail banking.: 130 China portal Money portal Numismatics portal ChineseSilver Panda Economic history of China List of Chinese cash coins by inscription...
independently in China. The Chinese coins, however, were a different concept and they were made of bronze. In the Mediterranean region, the silver and other...
(link) "Simplify visas for Chinese, urge UK retailers". Financial Times. 30 January 2011. Masidlover, Nadya (2013-07-24). "Chinese Shopping-Tour Buses Go...
and the Chinese to ship exports from Japan, after 1641 both through tightly controlled trading posts at Nagasaki, the Dutch at Dejima. The Chinese then resold...
and silver foil inlay of the Nara period (710–784). This technique was transmitted from China during the Tang dynasty. Coromandel lacquer is a Chinese export...
Global Information
