Information about bullet money

Here are some information about bullet money that I can found in the Internet. This post related to my earlier post in October; I meet Malaysia expert yesterday. He is looking for some information about bullet money or duit peluru. Some people called this Javanese etched iron ball-shaped charms. It look like musket bullet ball with some inscription on it. It maybe made in Surabaya from 1950s-80s. this bullet money of his come with Malay-Arabic inscription design. Some of the bullet money also have rooster design on it. There is no information about duit peluru in Malaysia even though I found in some forum that this money also had been used in Malaya before.


In Indonesia this bullet money called as Peluru Pitunang, Buntat Besi Pitunang or Peluru Bahari. They believe this is a talisman and owning this will help you get a better target of your shooting when you go for hunting. Your shot will be right into target, even though you shot to the south and the animals located in the north; you will never missed your target. They also suggest that owner of this talisman doesn't bring this when they board a flight. They believe the airplane cannot fly when the talisman is on board. I cannot find any Indonesian story that relating this thing with money. Maybe because I only found this thing in Indonesia mystical blogs but this is the closest thing to bullet money. I also found some of the pictures of this money in my Indonesian Facebook friends (sorry, I forget who own this picture). I wish any of you out there can help enlighten me about this.


In Thailand, there are also information about bullet money consisted of round balls of silver and gold and called as Pod Duang. Pod Duang currency used since the early Sukhothai dynasty in 1781 and was in use for more than 600 years until its abandon in the reign of King Rama V of the Rattanakosin Dynasty. The earliest of the Sukhothai Dynasty were in three sizes and valued in weight; one bath, half bath and quarter bath. The value of gold and silver is consider the same but the gold will look smaller then smaller because of its greater density. Until 1360, everyone are allowed to make their own bullet money provided that they conformed to government spesifications. By the time of Ayuthaya, they were some 22 different marking. The design of Pod Duang come from cowrie shell and most of the early money had hole in them, suggesting that they maybe strung together to carry around. The end for Pod Duang came when King Mongkut in 1860 declared that the currency will be change to fiat money design.
Source: Things Thai By Tanistha Dansilp, Michael Freeman

Its easy to find information about pod duang since they have their story documentad. To anyone of you who never read my earlier post about this bullet money, I am not owning any of this currency. I am just looking for information about this bullet money to understand more about it. If you have any information regarding this matter, please comment and share it in here.

Do any of you own this?

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