the records of prices.  China has always suffered from scarcity of metal.  For that reason metal was accumulated as capital, entailing a further rise in prices; when prices had reached a sufficient height, the stocks were thrown on the market and prices fell again.  Later, when there was a metal coinage, this cycle of inflation and deflation became still clearer.  The metal coinage was of its full nominal value, so that it was possible to coin money by melting down bronze implements.  As the money in circulation was increased in this way, the value of the currency fell.  Then it paid to turn coin into metal implements.  This once more reduced the money in circulation and increased the value of the remaining coinage.  Thus through the whole course of Chinese history the scarcity of metal and insufficiency of production of metal continually produced extensive fluctuations of the stocks and the value of metal, amounting virtually to an economic law in China.  Consequently metal implements were never universally in use, and vessels were always of earthenware, with the further result of the early invention of porcelain.  Porcelain vessels have many of the qualities of metal ones, but are cheaper.

The earthenware vessels used in this period are in many cases already very near to porcelain:  there was a pottery of a brilliant white, lacking only the glaze which would have made it into porcelain.  Patterns were stamped on the surface, often resembling the patterns on bronze articles.  This ware was used only for formal, ceremonial purposes.  For daily use there was also a perfectly simple grey pottery.

Silk was already in use at this time.  The invention of sericulture must therefore have dated from very ancient times in China.  It undoubtedly originated in the south of China, and at first not only the threads spun by the silkworm but those made by other caterpillars were also used.  The remains of silk fabrics that have been found show already an advanced weaving technique.  In addition to silk, various plant fibres, such as hemp, were in use.  Woollen fabrics do not seem to have been yet used.

The Shang were agriculturists, but their implements were still rather primitive.  There was no real plough yet; hoes and hoe-like implements were used, and the grain, mainly different kinds of millet and some wheat, was harvested with sickles.  The materials, from which these implements were made, were mainly wood and stone; bronze was still too expensive to be utilized by the ordinary farmer.  As a great number of vessels for wine in many different forms have been excavated, we can assume that wine, made from special kinds of millet, was a popular drink.