Item: i100058 Authentic Coin of:

Vietnam - Later Le Dynasty (1428-1527) Le Thanh Thong - Emperor: 1460-1497 Bronze Hong Duc Thong Bao Cash Token 24mm, Struck 1460-97 Reference: B 36.7, H 25.17, T 058 Chinese Symbols. You are bidding on the exact item pictured, provided with a Certificate of Authenticity and Lifetime Guarantee of Authenticity.

Lê Thánh Tông (25 August 1442 – 3 March 1497), personal name Lê Hạo, temple name Thánh Tông, courtesy name Tư Thành, was an emperor of Đại Việt, reigned from 1460 to 1497, the fifth monarch of the House of Lê Duy and is one of the greatest monarchs in Vietnamese history. He came to power through a coup d'état against his second brother Lê Nghi Dân in 1460. His reign is recognized for the extensive administrative, military, education, and fiscal reforms he instituted, and a cultural revolution that replaced the old traditional aristocracy with a generation of literati scholars. His era was eulogized as the Prospered reign of Hồng Đức.

Lê Thánh Tông introduced reforms designed to replace the Thanh Hoá oligarchy of Dai Viet's southern region with a corps of bureaucrats selected through the Confucian civil service examinations. Following the Chinese model, he divided the government into six ministries: Finance, Rites, Justice, Personnel, Army, and Public Works. Nine grades of rank were set up for both the civil administration and the military. A Board of Censors was set up with royal authority to monitor governmental officials and report exclusively to the emperor. However, governmental authority did not extend all the way to the village level. The villages were ruled by their own councils.

In 1469, all of Dai Viet was mapped and a full census, listing all the villages in the kingdom, was taken. Around this time, the country was divided into 13 dao (provinces). Each was administrated by a Governor, a Judge, and the local army commander. Thánh Tông also ordered that a new census should be taken every six years. Other public works that were undertaken included building and repair of granaries, using the army to rebuild and repair irrigation systems after floods, and sending out doctors to areas afflicted by outbreaks of disease. Even though the emperor, at 25, was relatively young, he had already restored Dai Viet's stability, which was a marked contrast from the turbulent times marking the reigns of the two emperors before him. By 1471, the kingdom employed more than 5,300 officials (0.1 percent of the population) into the bureaucrat army, equally divided between the court and the provinces, with at least one supervising officer every three villages.

A national-wide census was conducted in 1490, reported approximately 8,000 village-level jurisdictions throughout the country including the thirty-six urban wards that lay between the royal compound and the Red River at Dong Kinh, the only city in the country; with the total population was approximately 4.4 million people, the Red River delta had been the most densely inhabited region of Southeast Asia in the early-modern era.

The new government proved to be effective and represented a successful adaptation of the Chinese Confucian system of government outside of China. However, following the deaths of Thánh Tông and of his son and successor, Lê Hiến Tông (r. 1498–1504), this new model of government crashed not once but twice in the next three following centuries.

The Lê dynasty , also known as Later Lê dynasty (Vietnamese: Hậu  Lê triều Hán tự: 後黎朝 or Vietnamese: nhà Hậu Lê Hán tự: 家後黎 was the  longest-ruling Vietnamese dynasty, ruling Đại Việt from 1428 to 1789. The Lê  dynasty is divided into two historical periods – the Early period (Lê sơ triều,  Hán tự: 黎初朝; 1428–1527) before usurpation by the Mạc dynasty (1527–1683), in  which emperors ruled in their own right, and the restored period or Revival Lê (Lê  Trung hưng triều, Hán tự: 黎中興朝; 1533–1789), in which figurehead emperors reigned  under the auspices of the powerful Trịnh family. The Restored Lê period is  marked by two lengthy civil wars: the Lê–Mạc War (1533–1592) in which two  dynasties battled for legitimacy in northern Vietnam and the Trịnh–Nguyễn War  (1627–1672) between the Trịnh family in Tonkin and the Nguyễn lords of the  South.

The dynasty officially began in 1428 with the enthronement of Lê Lợi after he  drove the Ming army from Vietnam. The dynasty reached its peak during the reign  of Lê Thánh Tông and declined after his death in 1497. In 1527, the Mạc dynasty  usurped the throne; when the Lê dynasty was restored in 1533, the Mạc fled to  the far north and continued to claim the throne during the period known as  Southern and Northern Dynasties. The restored Lê emperors held no real power,  and by the time the Mạc dynasty was finally eradicated in 1677, actual power lay  in the hands of the Trịnh lords in the North and Nguyễn lords in the South, both  ruling in the name of the Lê emperor while fighting each other. The Lê dynasty  officially ended in 1789, when the peasant uprising of the Tây Sơn brothers  defeated both the Trịnh and the Nguyễn, ironically in order to restore power to  the Lê dynasty.

The Lê dynasty continued the nam tiến expansion of Vietnam's borders  southwards through the domination of the Kingdom of Champa and expedition into  today Laos and Myanmar, nearly reaching Vietnam's modern borders by the time of  the Tây Sơn uprising. It also saw massive changes to Vietnamese society: the  previously Buddhist state became Confucian after the preceding 20 years of Ming  rule. The Lê emperors instituted many changes modeled after the Chinese system,  including the civil service and laws. Their long-lasting rule was attributed to  the popularity of the early emperors. Lê Lợi's liberation of the country from 20  years of Ming rule and Lê Thánh Tông's bringing the country into a golden age  was well-remembered by the people. Even though the restored Lê emperors' rule  was marked by civil strife and constant peasant uprisings, few dared to openly  challenge their power for fear of losing popular support. The Lê dynasty also  was the period Vietnam saw the coming of Western Europeans and Christianity in  early 16th-century.

Cash was a type of coin of China and East Asia, used from the 4th century BC until the 20th century AD. Originally cast during the Warring States period, these coins continued to be used for the entirety of Imperial China as well as under Mongol, and Manchu rule. The last Chinese cash coins were cast in the first year of the Republic of China. Generally most cash coins were made from copper or bronze alloys, with iron, lead, and zinc coins occasionally used less often throughout Chinese history. Rare silver and gold cash coins were also produced. During most of their production, cash coins were cast but, during the late Qing dynasty, machine-struck cash coins began to be made. As the cash coins produced over Chinese history were similar, thousand year old cash coins produced during the Northern Song dynasty continued to circulate as valid currency well into the early twentieth century.

In the modern era, these coins are considered to be Chinese "good luck coins"; they are hung on strings and round the necks of children, or over the beds of sick people. They hold a place in various superstitions, as well as Traditional Chinese medicine, and Feng shui. Currencies based on the Chinese cash coins include the Japanese mon, Korean mun, Ryukyuan mon, and Vietnamese văn.