秦代律令中的黃金與銅錢問題──以岳麓秦簡、里耶秦簡為中心

The Question of Gold and Coin in the Legal System of the Qin Dynasty–A Study on the Yuelu Qin Slips and Liye Qin Slips

秦代律令中有「贖刑」、「貲刑」、「購金」、「購錢」等涉及財產賞罰之制度，其中「贖刑」、「貲刑」、「購金」等皆以黃金作為計價單位，予人秦代以黃金為重的印象，並產生諸多關於銅錢不穩定之論述。然而，脫離律令中名目上關於黃金之規定後，查諸各種涉及財務如何運作之實務律令，以及政府追索或賜予財物的實際案例，乃至於財物進出簿計等，大多罕見黃金，反而是銅錢反覆地出現在原本應該是黃金之位置。不可否認，這些實務中的銅錢大多是按照特定之黃金、銅錢比價換算而得，但在這種狀況之下，恐怕不能再認為秦政府係因為黃金價值穩定之特性而課徵黃金。作為賞賜用的「購錢」來源可分為直接予錢與黃金換算而得兩種，不同來源之「購錢」對同一行為的獎賞金額有相當程度差異，此種差異或顯示秦在統一前後強化法律執行效率。此外，秦至漢初律令中涉及金錢之項目，其金額並未隨貨幣制度之劇烈演變而有變化，這或顯示漢初在名義上持續維持「半兩錢」有關。這些現象主要呈現銅錢在法律實務中的地位，黃金更多是以一種名目的形式存在。惟需注意，這並非否認當時社會有黃金流通，而是其數量、頻率恐怕遠遠不如想像中之高。作為一種延伸的思考，此種現象或許可成為未來深入解釋漢代多黃金問題的重要關鍵。 In the laws of the Qin dynasty, we can see a system of rewards and punishments related to property like “Redemption Punishment” 贖刑, “Imposition Punishment” 貲刑, “Gold Reward” 購金 and “Coin Reward” 購錢 . Of these, “Redemption Punishment”, “Imposition Punishment” and “Gold Reward” use gold as the accounting unit. This gives the impression that the Qin dynasty took gold as a primary currency, because there are several deficiencies within copper coins. Aside from being used as the accounting unit in the legal texts concerning punishment and reward, however, gold is nowhere to be found; it does not appear within the texts concerning financial and accounting regulations. Instead, copper coin appears in all the places where we would expect gold to be. That some of these copper coins resulted from exchanging gold at a certain rate is undeniable, but given these conditions, it would be hard to say that the Qin government used gold as a preferred medium of exchange. The amount of a “Coin Reward” could be based on two sources: the first is an exchange with gold, and the second is directly specified by the law text. The amounts imposed by these two sources are quite different for the same legal offense; this might indicate the Qin government was trying to intensify enforcement of its laws after unification. Moreover, the amounts involved in reward and punishment did not change in the early Han dynasty even after dramatic changes in the currency system. This might be the result of the Han government nominally continuing its support of copper coins (ban liang Qian). Such phenomena primarily demonstrate the important status of copper coins in actual legal practice; gold had a more nominal existence in law. However, this article does not dispute the circulation of gold in the Qin and Han period, but it appears that the quantity of gold and the frequency of its circulation were not nearly so high as has been imagined. This might give us an entry point to explain the important issue of excess gold in the Han dynasty.