Stacks Hong Kong newp plus 'did you ever want to see the difference in 1870 yen types?'
Stork
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I picked this up out of the recent Stacks auction. It seemed a tad overlooked, it's got a few marks and drawbacks but no matter what it's a popular date and scarcer variety. The Japanese collecting market seems to be skewing much more heavily to PCGS, so the slab probably didn't help. I'm more slab agnostic (and actually have a few sets ATS as when I started there were more sets that aligned with my collecting interests--and now I'm too lazy to do the same over here).
Anyway, the more elusive type III Japanese yen:
This type is defined by a missing horizontal stroke in one of the characters:
Type I also has 2 varieties as recognized by the JNDA. And, there are far more out there, but the reading material is beyond my capabilities to parse through at my dilettante level. I have very few things that are recognizable varieties that are not in the JNDA.
In any case, this variety was well worth dipping into the designated 'coin savings account'. If nothing else, I no longer have to use cartoons to show them off side by side 
Comments
Congrats on the new pickup, and thank you for calling out the variety. I have owned 4 different examples with chopmarks, and each of them appears to be Type 1. I'm guessing that's the most common variety.
I always preferred the reverse of these 1st year issues to the reverse used for the rest of the series. Anyone know the story behind the change?
Very nice, congratulations !!!
what a great coin Stork!
Many members on this forum that now it cannot fit in my signature. Please ask for entire list.
The type 1 is definitely the most common. There are two versions in the JNDA depending on a 'with' or 'without' border distinction, which appears to be about the body of the rising sun. PCGS designates that variety within the variety as well. The 3 (or III, not sure which really matters) is the scarcest.
As for the design the dragon/rising sun was used in 1870-1871. The denominations were solely in Japanese script on the obverse/dragon side, while the reverse was more about design and motifs. In 1873 the dragon was retained on the obverse and was otherwise modified to change the denomination from Japanese style writing to Western. The rising sun was dropped from the reverse in favor of adding the denomination in a much more dominant size and in Japanese.
This was true for all the silver denominations (and the copper ones starting in 1873--copper did not have coins produced for mass release in 1870/71). Between 1906/7 the 50, 20, and 10 sen were reduced in weight and the dragon was replaced by the rising sun motif while otherwise keeping the overall placement of design elements.
The more lowly 5 sen had previously been dropped from the silver coinage club (common mintages by 1877, though 1880 is a special year), and as a base metal coin, had already undergone several design shifts. The 2, 1, 1/2 sen, 5 rin, 1 rin all had their own design trajectories as well.
There are some interesting patterns out there, as well as different/off metal strikes but these are far off my collecting pathway.
In any case, I don't have a resource to quote directly at the moment, but the point of going more global by introducing the new modern coinage (using Western methods) would support adding the denomination in both Japanese kanji and romaji (Roman) lettering. Having only kanji as in the first iteration defeated some of that purpose.
Thanks @Stork, you know your stuff!
Stork check this out..
https://www.numisbids.com/n.php?p=lot&sid=3156&lot=50
I give away money. I collect money.
I don’t love money . I do love the Lord God.
Oh boy, another auction house to check out