The “runner-up” is also domineering! Why is it called “bank” instead of “gold shop”?

1. Live under the aura of "gold"

As we all know, hardware refers to gold, silver, copper, iron, and tin. The domineering "gold" is naturally ranked first, followed by "silver". In our daily lives, whenever "gold" and "silver" appear together, in most cases "silver" is ranked behind "gold". It can be said that "silver" has always lived under the halo of "gold".

1.1 Medals

Medals are a kind of certificate for winners of various competitions, and are generally made of metal. The first, second and third place in sports competitions correspond to gold medals, silver medals and bronze medals, respectively, as shown in Figure 1. In 1907, the International Olympic Committee held an executive committee meeting in The Hague, Netherlands, and formally made a resolution to award gold medals, silver medals and bronze medals to Olympic winners, and it was officially implemented at the 4th London Olympic Games that followed.

Figure 1 Medal pictures (from left to right: gold medal, silver medal, bronze medal) (Picture from the Internet)

1.2 Honeysuckle

Honeysuckle, also known as honeysuckle, is named because its flowers are white at first and then turn yellow (Figure 2). It is sweet, cold and fragrant. It can clear away heat without hurting the stomach. Its fragrance can penetrate and dispel evil. This flower can not only dissipate wind-heat, but also clear blood toxins. It can treat various febrile diseases, such as fever, rash, spots, heat-toxic sores, sore throat, etc., with remarkable effects, so it is known as a good medicine for clearing heat and detoxification.

Figure 2 Honeysuckle (picture from the Internet)

So here comes the question. Honeysuckle clearly blooms white flowers (silver) first and then turns yellow flowers (gold), so why is it called "honeysuckle" instead of "silver-gold transformation"?

1.3 Gold and Silver Buns

Gold and silver steamed buns are a delicious traditional delicacy. They are made by kneading dough, fermenting, letting them rise, and steaming. They are uniform in size, soft and delicate, and are called "silver steamed buns" because of their white and shiny color. Half of the silver steamed bun is fried in oil, and it is called "gold steamed bun" because it turns golden yellow. Together, they are called "gold and silver steamed buns", and can be eaten with condensed milk when served (Figure 3).

Figure 3 Gold and silver steamed buns (picture from the Internet)

The same question is, since "silver buns" came first and "gold buns" came later, why is it named "gold and silver buns"? This may be due to the awe of the domineering "gold", so "silver" can only be ranked second.

1.4 Idioms containing gold and silver

In our daily life, we often encounter a large number of idioms related to "silver", but if "gold" is present, most of them are gold first and silver second. For example, "gold head and silver face" (dressed up with gold, silver and other ornaments), "golden nest and silver nest" (referring to a place where a lot of money is spent), "golden March and silver April" (March and April every year are the peak periods for talent recruitment), "gold, purple, silver and blue" (gold and purple refer to gold seals and purple ribbons; silver and blue refer to silver seals and blue ribbons, referring to the seals and ribbons worn by high-ranking officials, and are used to refer to dignitaries), "gold slaves and silver maids" (referring to slaves with gorgeous clothes), "real gold and silver", "inlaid gold and silver", "ringing gold and silver", "gold and silver jewelry", "gold and silver fine goods", "wearing gold and silver" (wearing precious and gorgeous clothes, describing the clothes as very gorgeous, Figure 4), etc.

Figure 4 Wearing gold and silver (Picture from the Internet)

Of course, there are exceptions. For example, the phrase "Silver Screen and Golden House" means silver is in front and gold is in the back. Silver Screen and Golden House describes an extremely luxurious residence and furnishings, and refers to a wealthy family, as shown in Figure 5.

Figure 5 Silver Screen Golden House (Picture from the Internet)

As an important precious metal, silver always gives people a good impression. For example, "silver-clad in white" and "silver frost everywhere" are often used to describe the beautiful scenery after the snow in winter (Figure 6); "silver flowers and fire trees" are metaphors for brilliant fireworks or lights (Figure 7); "fire candles and silver flowers" describe the brilliant night scene of lights and decorations or fireworks; "the Milky Way pouring down" describes the majestic water (Figure 8); "silver hook and iron painting" describes the vigorous and energetic brushwork of calligraphy and painting (Figure 9); "silver hook and scorpion tail finger flicking method is as vigorous as a silver hook"; "silver hook and jade spit" is used to describe the calligraphy strokes of others, which are like silver hooks, vigorous and powerful; "speech is like spitting jade, which is precious" (Figure 10); "silver mountain and iron wall" is used to describe the very strong and firm brushwork. Solid, indestructible things; the Milky Way star family refers to a certain collection of a large number of celestial bodies; the feathering of a silver cup refers to a silver wine cup floating up to the sky like a feather, which is a metaphor for precious objects being stolen and disappearing without a trace; mercury pouring down the ground is a metaphor for meticulous and extremely detailed and thoughtful, and also a metaphor for writing style, action, attack, etc. that are very smooth and done in one go; the jade rabbit and the silver toad are metaphors for the bright moon in the sky; jade dust and silver powder describe beautiful and eloquent conversation; pearl foil and silver screen describe the gorgeous furnishings of the immortal cave; the magpie driving the Milky Way refers to marriage, and comes from the legend of the magpie building a bridge across the Milky Way to ferry the Cowherd and the Weaver Girl across on the Qixi Festival.

Figure 6: Covered in silver (Picture from the Internet)

Figure 7 Silver Flower Fire Tree (Picture from the Internet)

Figure 8 The Milky Way pours down (picture from the Internet)

Figure 9 Silver hook iron painting (picture from the Internet)

Figure 10 Silver Hook and Jade Spit (Photo from the Internet)

In addition, in life, a milky white bright band across the starry sky is called the "Milky Way", which is more vivid and romantic than the Western Milk Way; the 25th year of marriage is called the "Silver Wedding", which is the first big celebration after marriage and has lasting value; white hair is also called "silver hair" and so on.

2. “Silver” is also domineering

2.1 Why is it called “bank” instead of “gold shop”?

A bank is a financial institution established in accordance with the law to conduct monetary and credit business. A bank is an enterprise that operates in the field of currency and is a very important member of the financial institutions. The business of a bank is divided into the following: (1) By collecting deposits, it collects idle monetary funds and small monetary surpluses in society and then lends them to people who need to replenish their currency in the form of loans. Here, the bank acts as an intermediary between lenders and borrowers. (2) Banks handle the collection, payment, and settlement of currency for commodity producers and merchants, acting as a payment intermediary.

Everyone knows that gold is more expensive than silver. From the origin of banks, it is not an exaggeration to call them gold banks, counter banks, or stool banks. But why are they called "banks" instead of "gold banks"?

Banks first appeared in Europe, and their English name is BANK. This word has nothing to do with "bank" or "bank". Tracing back to the origin, the places where currency identification and exchange were carried out in the West at that time were simple and there was only a bench in the office, so merchants called it "Banco". That is to say, the original meaning of "bank" is "bench". In 1694, the world's first bank, the Bank of England, was established, which is the ancestor of the central bank system of various countries (Figure 11). "Bank" here originally means "cabinet for saving money".

Figure 11 Bank of England (picture from the Internet)

So how did "BANK" become "Bank" in China? In fact, the word "Bank" already existed in Chinese before "BANK" was introduced to China. It was first seen in the Southern Tang Dynasty (937-975 AD). However, the ancient "Bank" had a different meaning from the modern "Bank". It was a gold and silver shop that melted silver ingots and made utensils and ornaments.

When the word "BANK" was introduced to my country, the currency at that time was mainly silver. Long before Western civilization came to China, China already had money houses, silver shops and other business houses that operated currency businesses. The word "silver" became a pronoun for currency, and "bank" came from the business house, so later the companies opened by foreigners in China were called "foreign companies".

According to research, the first person to translate the English word "BANK" into "Bank" was Kuang Qizhao from Guangdong, my country (Figure 12). According to the meaning of Chinese characters, "silver" is the precious metal currency that China has always used, and "hang" is larger than "dian", so naming an institution that operates a large-scale currency business as "Bank" is really a stroke of genius.

Figure 12 Kuang Qi taking a photo (Photo from the Internet)

The earliest mention of the word "bank" was in a book published in Hong Kong in 1856 (the sixth year of Emperor Xianfeng's reign in the Qing Dynasty), which talked about "bank notes". my country's first bank was the "Bank of China" established in 1897 (Figure 13). In 1904, the Ministry of Revenue (i.e., the Ministry of Finance) of the Qing Dynasty petitioned to establish the "Bank of the Ministry of Revenue of the Qing Dynasty", which was renamed "Bank of the Great Qing" in 1908. This was my country's first national bank.

Figure 13: One liang note of the Commercial Bank of China (Photo from the Internet)

Since many words in natural sciences and social sciences in modern Chinese were imported from Japan, some people mistakenly believe that the word "bank" was first used by the Japanese and then spread to China. In fact, this is not the case.

The Japanese originally translated "BANK" as "Kinkan". In 1870, when Finance Minister Ito Hirobumi was proposing to set up a new financial institution, he saw that Kuang Qizhao's Chinese-English Dictionary translated "BANK" as "Bank" and thought it was more appropriate than their original translation of "Kinkan". Therefore, the name "Bank" was used in the National Bank Ordinance published in 1872 (the 5th year of Meiji).

2.2 Cashier

As an essential supporting facility in shopping malls and supermarkets, the cashier counter is where customers make payments and transactions, and it is also the last place where customers stay in the store (Figure 14).

Figure 14 Cashier counter (picture from the Internet)

Why is it called a cash register instead of a gold collection counter, cash collection counter, or money collection counter? This is because in ancient China, silver was used more than gold in people's daily lives. Later, silver and money were widely circulated in the booming commercial exchanges. Until the "cash collection cabinet" was introduced from the West, it was also named "cash register".

3. Conclusion

Among the five metals, silver ranks second; among medals, silver ranks second; in idioms such as real gold and silver, wearing gold and silver, silver is almost always ranked behind gold. However, the Chinese name of "BANK" - "Bank", which is neither "gold bank" nor "copper bank", is enough to make "silver" famous and majestic, and make the second place domineering!

About the author: Jia Chengchang, professor and doctoral supervisor at University of Science and Technology Beijing. Graduated from the Department of Metal Materials of Beijing Iron and Steel Institute in 1982 with a bachelor's degree. Obtained a master's degree from Tohoku University, Japan in 1987. Obtained a doctorate from Tohoku University, Japan in 1990. Postdoctoral fellow and chief engineer at Kanagawa Science City, Japan from 1990 to 1994. Won more than 30 national invention patents. Published more than 200 papers in domestic and foreign academic journals, including 76 SCI-indexed papers and 127 EI-indexed papers, and a single article has been cited more than 100 times. Edited 15 academic monographs: "Composites Tutorial", "Introduction to Ceramic Matrix Composites", "Sintered Metal Oil-bearing Bearings", "Introduction to Metal Matrix Composites", "Superhard Materials and Tools", "Metal Powder Gel Injection Molding", "Sintering Practice and Scientific Foundation", "Professor Han Fenglin's Papers", etc. He has won the second prize of Science and Technology Progress of the Ministry of Education, the first prize of Excellent Textbooks of China Metallurgical Education Association, the first prize of National Teaching Achievement in Higher Education (participated), the first prize of Education and Teaching Achievement of Beijing, the second prize of Excellent Journal of China Nonferrous Metals Society, the Outstanding Worker of China Metal Society, the Outstanding Instructor of the "Challenge Cup" National College Student Science and Technology Competition, the Outstanding Editorial Board Member of "Journal of Composite Materials" of the Composite Materials Society, "I Love My Teacher - the Best Teacher in My Mind" of Beijing University of Science and Technology, Advanced Individual in Teacher Ethics, Outstanding Party Member, Advanced Worker, First Prize for Teaching Achievement, SCI Inclusion Award for Scientific Papers and other honors. Main social part-time jobs: Honorary Director of China Composite Materials Society, Honorary Director of Powder Metallurgy Branch of China Metal Society, Executive Director of Powder Metallurgy Branch of China Mechanical Engineering Society, Director of Powder Metallurgy and Ceramics Branch of China Nonferrous Metals Society, Honorary Director of Powder Metallurgy Branch of China Steel Structure Association, Distinguished Expert of China Nonferrous Processing Association, Director of Powder Branch of China Building Materials Industry Association, Distinguished Expert of Powder Metallurgy Branch of China Machinery Association, Editorial Board Member of Journal of Composite Materials, Consultant of Powder Metallurgy Technology, Editorial Board Member of Powder Metallurgy Industry, Editorial Board Member of China Molybdenum Industry, Editorial Board Member of Powder Metallurgy Materials Science and Engineering, Editorial Board Member of China Materials Science and Equipment, Guest Contributor of Metal World