How did commerce develop and change in ancient China? What were its characteristics?

(1) Changes in the places of commercial activities: first in the city

, then to the rural bazaar; first fixed time

, place, then to break the boundaries.

(2) changes in the content of the transaction: first to the exchange of regional

inter-regional specialties, luxury goods, and then agricultural

products, as well as handicrafts to the market.

(3) Changes in the medium of exchange: at the beginning it was the exchange of goods

, then the emergence of general equivalents - shells and other goods

coins, and then the currency was fixed as gold and silver. In the Northern Song Dynasty, there was also

the emergence of paper money, jiaozi (交子).

(4) Changes in the organization of merchants: from the initial kinship

organization developed into geographic and industrial organizations.

(5) Changes in the sphere of circulation: from being confined to the sphere of circulation

to being gradually

integrated with the wage labor of the producers.