About 500,000 ceramic coins produced because of metal shortages during World War Two but never circulated have been discovered in Kyoto City, western Japan.
The Japan Mint recently announced that a firm in the city found wooden boxes containing the coins in a warehouse in August of last year. The warehouse was the site of a former mint.
The coins are all 1 sen, or one hundredth of a yen. They bear images of Mount Fuji and cherry blossoms. The firm handed over the coins to the mint office.
Mint officials says a total of about 15 million ceramic 1-, 5- and 10-sen tokens were manufactured as an alternative to traditional money.
But the coins were never used, as they were discarded following the end of the war. Some people call them “phantom” coins.
Officials say the discovery of such a large amount of ceramic coins is extremely rare.
On Wednesday, the head of the Japan Mint, Goto Kenji, handed a letter of appreciation to Takami Tetsuo, the president of the firm that discovered the coins.
Goto said he hopes ceramic coins will reveal various aspects of Japan’s economy during the wartime turmoil.
Takami said metal was difficult to come by at that time, even affecting the minting of coins. He expressed the hope that the discovered coins can be used to study the hardships of war.