What is ￥ ?

[Mike]

Does ￥ mean 元 ?

Why 元 and not 圆 ?

When do you use kuai4 instead of yuan2 and mao2 instaed of jiao3 ?

When talking about money, when does fen1 (分) get used - like 十三块五毛六分 ?

Helppppppppppp!!!!!!!

[necroflux]

Edit - ignore this post, correct answers follow my bad info.

As far as what's showing up on my computer, ￥ is not a Chinese character, your computer is displaying garbage, perhaps your encoding settings in your browser are wrong. Not sure about your other questions.

[zhwj]

￥ is used like $.

圆 is 大写 like 壹贰叁肆伍陆.

块 is less formal that 元 - 块 is more used in colloquial speech - 块毛分 is one system, 元角分 is another.

分 can be often be dropped. ￥4.26 can be read 四块两毛六.

[novemberfog]

In Taiwan, they use NT$ for money. In Japan, they use 円 and in China (and also Taiwan sometimes) you often see 元. But ￥ is just a mark to show that the number that follows represents money.

[Chinapage]

The symbol ￥ denotes "Japanese yen", just as $ denotes U.S. dollar.

It is not used to denote "Chinese yuan" or RMB.

Ming

[hakkaboy]

If you have any spare ￥ - give them to me!

[novemberfog]

The symbol ￥ denotes "Japanese yen", just as $ denotes U.S. dollar.

It is not used to denote "Chinese yuan" or RMB.

I beg to differ, Ming. I have seen it used by several Chinese when describing prices to non-Chinese speaking businessmen. And not Japanese businessmen either. It may not be official, but sales guys from the PRC do use it.

[Quest]

The symbol ￥ denotes "Japanese yen", just as $ denotes U.S. dollar.

It is not used to denote "Chinese yuan" or RMB.

¥ is used everywhere in China to denote Chinese yuan.

[yiwei]

¥ is used everywhere in China to denote Chinese yuan.

indeed. i used to do a part-time job for a bank in China. ¥ is a formal denotation of Chinese yuan. we have to use it in front of figures once we denote Chinese yuan in Arabic numbers.

[Chinapage]

In international usage, especially financial newspapers etc,

The symbol € denotes euro dollar, £ denotes british pound, and ¥ for Japanese yen.

In China, this seems to be different. So we need to be careful.

Ming

[Lu]

Ming, there is no such thing as the "European Dollar". Here in Europe we use Euros, you won't get far using dollars.

As to the ¥, like Quest I've seen it used for renminbi, and also for Japanese yen.

[Quest]

In international usage, especially financial newspapers etc,

The symbol € denotes euro dollar, £ denotes british pound, and ¥ for Japanese yen.

In China, this seems to be different. So we need to be careful.

Ming

I could be totally wrong, I suspect ¥ has been around since ancient times? and the Japanese probably got it from China.

[HashiriKata]

I suspect ¥ has been around since ancient times? and the Japanese probably got it from China.

Do you see the letter Y (= Yen) within the symbol ¥ ?

(Do you think the Latin alphabet also came from Ancient China? )

[liuzhou]

I'm fairly certain that the Japanese not only got ¥ from China, but the word 'Yen' came from 'Yuan', too.

[charlescpp]

Did people in the ancient time use 元?

I assume they use 两 or 文.

[Quest]

Do you see the letter Y (= Yen) within the symbol ¥ ?

(Do you think the Latin alphabet also came from Ancient China? )

They probably abandoned it in favor of characters. Lets bring ancient to a little more recent, at the creation of the symbol, until I am totally disproved.

Btw, when I was a kid I pronounced it 羊(also Y-ang), that's where my idea came from.

[charlescpp]

Btw, when I was a kid I pronounced it 羊(also Y-ang), that's where my idea came from.

I thought it was 半 when i was a kid:)

[Mugi]

For what it's worth, a few wikipedia pages, although none of them are definitive in answering the "which came first" question.

Japanese Yen

Chinese Yuan and Renminbi

Korean Won

This page states that the first Chinese yuan was introduced in 1889, while the Yen page notes that the yen was introduced in 1870 (although 広辞苑 Kojien says 1871). The question is, were these respective terms in colloquial use before official introduction as currency?

My totally uninformed feeling is that the Chinese term (as used to refer to currency) is borrowed from Japanese, as was the case with so many other words and concepts at that time.

[liuzhou]

as was the case with so many other words and concepts at that time.

such as?

[gato]

liuzhou, see this article.

http://www.pkucn.com/viewthread.php?tid=4651

我们今天使用的社会和人文科学方面的名词、术语，有70％是从日本输入的！（转贴，有删略）

原转贴者：唱诗者

现在我们常用的一些基本术语、词汇，大都是此时自日本舶来。如服务、组织、纪律、政治、革命、政府、党、方针、政策、申请、解决、理论、哲学、原则等等，实际上全是来自日语的“外来语”，还有像经济、科学、商业、干部、健康、社会主义、资本主义、法律、封建、共和、美学、文学、美术、抽象……数不胜数，全是来自日语。

　在日语“外来语”中，具象和抽象两类名词都有。具象名词今天仍在使用的，可举“电话” 和“俱乐部”两词为例。“电话”是日本人生造的汉语词，用来意译英文的telephone。当初中国人对这个英文词采取了音译，译作“德律风”。在一段时期内，“电话”和“德律风”两种叫法通用。但后来，“德律风”这种叫法终于湮灭。关于这个译名，我发现过一点有趣的资料。本世纪初年，一群在日本的绍兴籍留学生曾联名给家乡写回一封长信，其中详细介绍了日本的近代化情形，鲁迅也列名其中。信中说到“电话” 时，特意注释道：“以电气传达言语，中国人译为‘德律风’，不如电话之切。”于此亦可见日语输入中国的途径之一种。而“俱乐部”则是日本人对英文Club 的音译。这几个汉字，音、形、意三方面都是绝佳的选择，所以在中国沿用至今。但也有些日译具象名词进入中国后，又被淘汰，例如“虎列拉”，在中国曾被使用了相当长的时间，但如今却被“霍乱”取代。

　　而在近代，当日本与西方语言遭遇后，大量采用汉语抽象名词去译西方概念，例如，用“经济”译“economy”，用“自然”译“nature”，用 “文学”释“literaure”。作为中国人，我们应该知道这些被日本人用来译西方的词汇，原本是从中国输入的，但我们更应该知道，这些汉语词在传入日本后，其中不少意义都不同程度地发生了变化。抽象名词从一个民族传入另一个民族，不可能始终保持原汁原味，即便在文化发展阶段相等的两个民族间，也可能发生误读和误解，何况当时的日本在文化发展阶段上与中国如此悬殊。那一大批植根于中国文化中的抽象名词被日本移植过去后，要真正在日本文化中扎根生长，就必然要与汉语原意发生某种程序的分离。日本现代学术界对这些汉语词在古汉语中的原意以及传入日本后的意义变化，也多有考索。例如“经济”一词，在古汉语中指 “经世济俗”、“治国平天下”，但传入日本后，则意义变得狭窄起来，被专用来指财务经营、财政措施。再如“自然”这个词，在古汉语中指不依赖人力，或人对之无能为力的现象，但在传入日本后，却具有了“偶然”、“万一”、“意外”这几种意思。

　　还有的词，在汉语中原本只被用于一种很具象的场合，并不具有明显的抽象意义，但在传入日本后，词义则渐渐向抽象的方向发展。例如，现代汉语中的“社会”这个词，已是一个抽象名词，是日语“外来语”中的一个。这是日本学人对西方“society”的翻译。但“社会”在古汉语中，基本上是一个具象名词，特指每年春秋两季乡村学塾举行的祭祀土地神的集会。《辞海》上举《东京梦华录·秋社》中的一段话来说明这个词：“八月秋社……市学先生预敛诸生钱作社会，以致雇倩祗应、白席、歌唱之人。归时各携花篮、果实、食物、社糕而散。春社、重午、重九，亦是如此。”但这个词传入日本后，渐渐别有所指。据日本学者铃木修次考证，在江户末期，日本已将以教会为中心的教团、教派称作“社会”，这就已经使这个词具有一定程度的抽象意义。