Chinese people use the phrase “yao chan wan guan,” or “carrying ten thousand strings of cash around the waist,” to describe wealth. But how much was a string of cash, and what could one buy in ancient China?
Guan was a traditional Chinese unit of account. Literally referring to the string used to thread coins together, it emerged alongside the round coin with a square hole, which first appeared during the Qin dynasty (221–206 BC).
A guan generally equalled a string of 1,000 individual copper or…
Source: www.scmp.com
