Part 10

The early gold and silver coins of Akbar bear the same inscriptions, though there is some variation in their arrangement. Following Bābur’s and the Sūrī coinage, the Kalima and Companions’ names appear on the obverse, and on the reverse at the beginning of the reign the following inscription, “_Jalālu-d-dīn Muḥammad Akbar, Emperor, champion of the Faith, the mighty Sultan, the illustrious Emperor, may God most High perpetuate the kingdom and the sovereignty_.” Portions of this are dropped later on (Pl. X, 7). Squares, circles, lozenges and other geometrical figures are employed to contain the more important parts of the legend, and the mint name always, and the date generally, appear on the reverse. About the year A.H. 985 the shape of the coins was changed from round to square, but the same inscriptions were retained.

In the year 1579 (A.H. 987) Akbar promulgated his Infallibility Decree, and in the same year appear quarter rupees from the Fatḥpūr, Lāhor, and Aḥmadābād mints, with a new inscription, _Allāhu Akbar_, upon the obverse. From the thirty-second year an expanded form of this, _Allāhu Akbar jalla jalālahu_, “God is great, eminent is His glory,” appears on a mintless series of square silver coins (Pl. X, 11); and from the thirty-sixth year it is used regularly on the square issues of the chief mints; later on there is a reversion to the round form. These Ilāhī coins are all dated in Akbar’s new regnal era,[63] and also bear the names of the Persian solar months. The custom of issuing coins monthly continues with a few breaks in Jahāngīr’s reign until the early years of Shāh Jahān. The round Ilāhī coins, especially those of Āgra, Patna and Lāhor, display considerable artistic merit: certain issues of Āgra of the fiftieth year (Pl. X, 8) are probably the finest of the whole Mug̱ẖal series. Among the many remarkable coins struck by Akbar may be mentioned the muhar, shaped like a double _Mihrāb_, which appeared from the Āgra mint in A.H. 981 (Pl. X, 6); the Ilāhī muhar of the fiftieth year, from the same mint, engraved with the figure of a duck (Pl. X, 9); the beautiful “hawk” muhar, struck at Asīrgarh in commemoration of its conquest in the forty-fifth year; and the mintless half-muhar, bearing the figures of Sītā and Rāma. Specimens of all these are in the British Museum. Akbar also initiated the practice of inscribing verse-couplets on the coinage, into which was worked the emperor’s name or the mint, or both. These were used by him for only three mints, but with Jahāngīr the practice became general, and forty-seven different couplets of his reign have been recorded (cf. Key to Pl. XI, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6).

[63] This starts from 28th Rab’ī II, A.H. 963, the first year of his reign, but was not instituted until the 29th year. The earliest known coin dated in this era is of the year 31.

Jahāngīr’s gold and silver coins in their endless variety are the most ornate of all Mug̱ẖal coins. Starting with a Kalima obverse, and his name and titles on the reverse (Pl. X, 1), he soon adopted a couplet legend; sometimes the couplet is peculiar to a single mint, sometimes it serves a group of mints. During the fifth and sixth years at Āgra (Pl. XI, 4) and Lāhor the couplets were for a short time changed every month. In the latter year followed a new type, with the emperor’s name on the obverse, and the month, date and mint name on the reverse; this remains till the end of the reign on the coins of some mints, but at Āgra, Lāhor, Qandahār and one or two others there is a return to the couplet inscription. For varying periods between the years A.H. 1033 and 1037 the name of the Empress Nūr Jahān is associated in a couplet with that of Jahāngīr on the issues of Āgra, Aḥmadābād, Akbarnagar, Ilahābād, Patna, Sūrat (Pl. XI, 5) and Lāhor.

Jahāngīr seemed to find unceasing zest in novelty: from the sixth to the thirteenth year of his reign the rupees of Āgra were minted in the square and round shape in alternate months. In the thirteenth year appeared the famous Zodiac coins, on which pictorial representations of the signs of the zodiac were substituted for the names of the months on the reverse; this type was retained on the Āgra muhars (Pl. XI, 2) till the seventeenth year. The Zodiac rupees of Aḥmadābād lasted only for five months during the thirteenth year, while single gold and silver coins of this type are known of Lāhor, Fatḥpūr, Ajmer, Urdū and Kashmīr, of various years up to A.H. 1036. The so-called Bacchanalian and portrait muhars have been recently shown to be insignia presented by Jahāngīr to his courtiers.[64] Some of these are mintless, others were struck at Ajmer. On the obverse of the latter the emperor appears seated cross-legged with a wine-cup in his hand (Pl. XI, 3). The most remarkable of the former, struck in the first year of the reign, bears a full-faced portrait of Akbar on the obverse along with the inscription _Allāhu Akbar_, while a representation of the sun covers the whole of the reverse.[65]

[64] By S. H. Hodivala, _Historical Studies in Mug̱ẖal Numismatics_, Memoir No. II, Numismatic Society of India, Calcutta, 1923.

[65] In the possession of Mr. H. Nelson Wright, I.C.S.

The beauty and rarity of the couplet rupees of Ajmer, Urdū dar rāh-i-Dakan, “The camp on the road to the Deccan” and Mandū, as well as a muhar from the last mint, all struck between the ninth and eleventh years, entitle them to special mention.

Few of Shāh Jahān’s coins (A.H. 1037-1068) are of any artistic merit. The earliest form of his gold and silver has the Kalima and mint name on the obverse, and the emperor’s name and titles on the reverse (Pl. XI, 7). From the second to the fifth year solar months[66] were inscribed. From the fifth year to the end of the reign, except at the Tatta mint, where the earlier style was retained, Shāh Jahān employed a type, endless in its varieties, in which squares, circles, lozenges form borders enclosing the Kalima on the obverse and the king’s name on the reverse, while the names of the companions and their epithets are restored and appear in the obverse margins. The square border form of this type was also employed by Aurangzeb’s rivals, Murād Baḵẖ̱sh and Shāh Shujā’ (Pl. XI, 10); and Aurangzeb uses square areas to contain the inscriptions on his earlier rupees of Akbarābād (Āgra) and Jūnagarh, and for a few coins of three other mints.

[66] Jahāngīr used a solar era of his own, starting from the date of his accession. The years on Shāh Jahān’s coins are lunar. Cf. Hodivala, _loc-cit._

The coins of Aurangzeb (A.H. 1068-1119) and his successors are, with a very few exceptions, monotonous in the extreme. On the obverse there is either a couplet containing the king’s name, or this inscription: “_The blessed coin of ..._,” followed by the name of the particular king. On the reverse appears, with very occasional variations, the following: “_Struck at_ (the mint name), _in the year_ (the regnal year) _of the accession associated with prosperity_.” The Hijrī date is placed on the obverse (Pl. XI, 9). Pretentious personal titles are of infrequent occurrence on Mug̱ẖal coins. Nevertheless the pretenders, Murād Baḵẖ̱sh and Shāh Shujā’, style themselves “The Second Alexander.” Shāh Jahān I, in imitation of his ancestor Tīmūr, who adopted the title “_Lord of the fortunate conjunction_” (_i.e._ of the planets), called himself “_The Second Lord of the fortunate conjunction_” (_Ṣāḥib-i-qirān s̤āni_), and eight later emperors followed his example. Jahāngīr used his princely name, Salīm, on his earliest coins from the Aḥmadābād mint (Pl. XI, 6) and on a half rupee of Kābul. On a unique rupee of Lāhor of Shāh Jahān I’s first year occurs the name Ḵẖ̱urram, while Shāh ’Ālam Bahādur placed his pre-regnal name, Mu’az̤z̤am, on coins of his first year of Tatta and Murshidābād.

Coins of special interest and rarity are those struck by pretenders, particularly the rupees of Dāwar Baḵẖ̱sh of Lāhor, A.H. 1037; the coins of Shāh Shujā’, 1068, of Bīdār Baḵẖ̱t, 1202-1203; and the rupee of Jahāngīrnagar, struck by ’Az̤īmu-sh-shān in 1124. Commemorative coins of the later emperors are exceedingly scarce, but the entry of Lord Lake into Dehlī, in 1803, was marked on Shāh ’Ālam II’s gold and silver coinage of the forty-seventh year by enclosing the obverse and reverse inscriptions within a wreath of roses, shamrocks and thistles (Pl. XII, 1).

The fabric of the copper coins is, in general, rude. With the exception of the _tankah_ and _tānkī_ issues, Akbar’s copper is anonymous; his Ilāhī copper, like the silver and gold, was dated in the new era and issued monthly. Some of Jahāngīr’s _rawānīs_, especially those from the Ajmer mint, have pretensions to artistic merit. His copper issues, and those of succeeding kings, with the exception of a few of Aurangzeb’s, have the king’s name and Hijrī date on the obverse, and the mint and regnal year on the reverse.

The Hijrī era was used by all emperors and usually the regnal year is inscribed as well. For his later coins, as has been seen, Akbar employed his own Divine era, Jahāngīr and Shāh Jahān I each used similar eras, but as they place the Hijrī year along with the solar months on the coins the calculation of the dates is somewhat confusing.

From the time of Humāyūn onwards there appear on the coinage certain marks, sometimes called mint marks, but perhaps more properly designated ornaments (Fig. 9). The purpose of these on the earlier issues is uncertain, later on they sometimes marked a change of mint-masters; others appear to have been really distinctive mint marks, such as that which appears on Shāh ’Ālam II’s Shāhjahānābād coins (Fig. 9, 2).

Perhaps the most distinctive feature of the Mug̱ẖal coinage is the diversity of mints. Akbar’s known mints number seventy-six. Copper was struck in fifty-nine of these, the largest number recorded for any emperor, while silver is known from thirty-nine. Aurangzeb’s conquests in the Deccan raised the silver mints to seventy, whereas copper mints sank to twenty-four. For the remaining emperors mints for silver average about fifty until Shāh ’Ālam II’s time, when they rose to eighty; most of these, however, were not under the imperial control. The puppet emperors, Akbar II and Bahādur Shāh, were permitted by the East India Company to strike coins only in their prison capital, Shāhjahānābād (Dehlī). Altogether over two hundred mints are known, but the greater number of these were worked only occasionally; Āgra, Dehlī, Lāhor and Aḥmadābād alone struck coin continuously throughout the Mug̱ẖal period. To these may be added Sūrat, Ilahābād, Jahāngīrnagar and Akbarnagar from Jahāngīr’s reign, Multān from the reign of Shāh Jahān I, and Itāwah and Barelī from the time of Aurangzeb. The practice of giving mint towns honorific titles, in vogue with the early Muhammadan Sultans, was continued by the Mug̱ẖals. Thus Dehlī became, on being selected as the capital of the empire by Shāh Jahān I, in A.H. 1048, Shāhjahānābād. In the second year of the same reign Āgra became Akbarābād. Epithets were also frequently attached to mint names. _Dāru-l-ḵẖ̱ilāfat_, “Seat of the Khalifate,” _i.e._ “Chief City,” is applied to twelve mints besides Āgra. _Dāru-s-salt̤anat_ is the usual epithet of Lāhor. After A.H. 1100 Aurangzeb changed the name of Aurangābād to Ḵẖ̱ujista Bunyād, “The fortunate foundation,” the only example of a Mug̱ẖal mint called solely by an honorific epithet.

The great system of coinage illustrated by the Mug̱ẖals, operating over such wide territories, needed, as has been already remarked, a master hand to control it. With the dissensions which set in between rival claimants to the empire on the death of Aurangzeb, the controlling power was weakened. The diminished resources of his treasury compelled the emperor, Farruḵẖ̱siyar (1713-19), to adopt the fatal policy of farming out the mints. This gave the _coup de grâce_ to the system, and henceforward, as will be related in the next chapter, we find independent, and semi-independent chiefs and states striking coins of their own, but always with the nominal consent of the Dehlī emperor, and almost invariably in his name. Not until the nineteenth century was the Mug̱ẖal style and superscription generally discarded.

Such was the coinage of the “Great Mogul.” Considering it as the output of a single dynasty, which maintained the high standard and purity of its gold and silver for three hundred years, considering also its variety, the number of its mints, the artistic merit of some of its series, the influence it exerted on contemporary and subsequent coinages, and the importance of its standard coin—the rupee—in the commerce of to-day, the Mug̱ẖal currency surely deserves to rank as one of the great coinages of the world.

X

CONTEMPORARIES AND SUCCESSORS OF THE MUG̱H̱ALS

The neighbours of the Mug̱ẖals were not slow to recognise the excellence of their coinage. Even the Ṣafavī monarchs of Persia adopted certain features. The East Himalayan kingdom of Assam, hitherto content to use the money of Bengal, and the adjacent state of Nepāl, which had been without a coinage of its own for centuries, within fifty years of Akbar’s accession had both adopted the rupee standard.

I. THE COINAGE OF ASSAM

Assam, the ancient Kāmarūpa, had been invaded in A.D. 1228 by the Ahoms, a Shan tribe from Burma, and finally subdued by them in 1540. By the year 1695 the royal family had definitely submitted to the influence of Hinduism. Previously to that date, expression of devotion to the tribal gods Lengdun, Tara and Phatuceng appears on the coins; but the reverse legend of a coin of the Śaka year 1618 (A.D. 1696), struck by Rudra Siṁha (1696-1714), runs as follows, in the highly poetical Sanskrit so characteristic of later coin inscriptions: “_A bee on the nectar of the feet of Hara and Gaurī_.”

The earliest known coins are those of Śuklenmung (1539-52), but these and the money of his five successors were struck for ceremonial occasions, probably only at the coronation, and a yearly coinage was first introduced by Rudra Siṁha. The strange octagonal shape of the coins is said to owe its origin to a statement in the Yoginī Tantra, which describes the Ahom country as octagonal. Some of the smaller coins are, however, round, and Śiva Siṁha, for a coin of Ś. 1651, on which he associates the name of his queen, Pramatheśvarī, and Rājeśvara Siṁha (1751-69), for two of his issues, adopted the square Mug̱ẖal form and style with legends in Persian. The inscription on Śiva Siṁha’s coin is as follows: obverse, _Shāh Sheo Singh struck coin like the sun by order of the Queen Pramatheśvarī Shāh_; reverse, _In the year 15 of the fortunate reign at Gargāon 1651_ (= A.D. 1729). For this the Nūr Jahān issues of Jahāngīr were obviously the model. With the exception of a coin of Śuklenmung, all gold and silver was struck to a standard of 176 grains, and half, quarter, eighth, and even smaller fractional pieces were minted. Several of the earlier Rājas employed the Ahom language and script for their legends. Sanskrit written in the Bengālī script was first used by Sūrya Nārāyaṇa (1611-49). Pramatta Siṁha (1744-51) and Rājeśvara Siṁha employ both, but after the coronation ceremony of the latter Sanskrit alone was used. The legends, in either script, are always enclosed within dotted borders (Pl. XII, 8). These thick rather solid-looking coins, though attractive on account of their unusual shape, are entirely without artistic merit; they ceased to be minted with the cession of Assam to the British in 1826. The broad round silver pieces of the Rājas of Jaintia (Jayantāpura) of the eighteenth century, and the coins of the hill state of Tipperah, bear legends similar in style to the Assamese Sanskrit coins, and, like them, are dated in the Śaka era. The dates on the Ahom coins of Assam are reckoned according to the Jovian cycle of sixty years.

II. THE COINAGE OF NEPĀL

The considerable Mug̱ẖal influence exhibited in the modern coinage of the Malla kings of Nepāl, which starts in the early years of the seventeenth century, finds expression in the native legend which affirms that Rāja Mahendra Malla of Kāthmāṇḍū obtained permission to strike coins from the Dehlī court. Although none of his money has come to light, the story gains some support from the weight of the early Nepalese coins, which are all half-rupees, and from a curious piece of Pratāpa Malla of Kāthmāṇḍū (1639-89), which imitates Jahāngīr’s coinage, even adopting fragments of the Persian inscription.

Nepāl, at the period when the coinage begins, was divided into three principalities—Bhatgāon, Pātan and Kāthmāṇḍū—and probably the earliest coins are those of Lakshmī Narasiṁha, ruler of the last province (1595-1639), although the earliest date, Nepālī Samvat[67] 751 (= A.D. 1631) appears on one struck by Siddhi Narasiṁha of Pātan. The usual design on the coins, perhaps suggested by some of Akbar’s and Jahāngīr’s issues, consists of elaborate geometrically ornamented borders surrounding a central square or circle, with the legends in Nāgarī fitted into the spaces left in the design. On the obverse appear the king’s name, titles and date, and on the reverse various symbols, accompanied sometimes by a further title or a religious formula. The Gūrkhas, who conquered the country in 1768, continued the style of their predecessors (Pl. XII, 6), but occasionally struck full as well as the ordinary half-rupees. Gīrvāṇ Yuddha Vikrama (1799-1816) and Surendra Vikrama (1847-81) also struck gold similar in design to the silver coins, and the latter introduced a copper currency.

[67] This Nepālī or Newār era was introduced by Rāja Rāghavadeva in A.D. 879.

The silver _tang-ka_ (tankah) of Tibet was directly imitated from the coinage of Jagajjaya Malla of Kāthmāṇḍū (1702-32).

III. SUCCESSORS TO THE MUG̱H̱ALS

The confusion into which the coinage of India fell on the break up of the Mug̱ẖal power, when independent mints sprang up in every part of their wide dominions, may be gathered from the calculation made in the early part of the nineteenth century, that there were no less than 994 different gold and silver coins, old and new, passing as current in the country. The complexity of the subject is further accentuated by the impossibility of distinguishing at present the earlier coins of independent mints from the imperial issues. Later on, the gradual debasement, caused by the addition of special local marks and the evolution of distinctive types in certain states, makes classification easier. Few of these coinages have hitherto been treated comprehensively, and all that can be attempted here is a bare outline, according more detailed treatment only to the more considerable moneying states.

The papers of the East India Company, fortunately, have preserved for us a record of events typical of what was taking place in many parts of India. They show that, besides coining the South Indian pagodas, already noticed, and copper and silver coins in European style, the English factories were early engaged in reproducing the rupees of the Mug̱ẖal emperors. The first which can be fixed with any certainty are those from the mint of Bombay, or Mumbai, as it appears on the coins, opened in the reign of Farruḵẖ̱siyar (1713-19); and in 1742 the emperor, Muḥammad Shāh, granted the Company a _sanad_ permitting them to coin Arkāt rupees. Gradually the Company assumed control of all mints within its increasing territories. In 1765, for example, after the battle of Buxar it took over the Bengal mints. Uniformity of standard was maintained, first by engraving special marks on the coins (Fig. 9, 4), and then by fixing the regnal year.[68] Thus the gold and silver coins of the Banāras mint of the Hijrī years 1190 to 1229 all bear the same regnal date 17.[69] So also the year 19 was fixed for the Murshidābād mint, the year 45 for Farruḵẖ̱ābād. These coins, still inscribed with the Mug̱ẖal emperor’s name, became more and more European in style (Pl. XII, 9), those of Farruḵẖ̱ābād being even struck with a milled edge, until finally superseded by the British Imperial currency of 1835.

[68] This was to stop peculation on the part of money-changers, bankers and even revenue collectors, who made a rebate on all rupees not of the current year.

[69] On the Banāras coins the actual regnal date, _i.e._ of Shāh ’Ālam II, is added beneath the conventional date 17; this was not adopted for other mints.

A similar evolution, but in the direction of deterioration, can be traced in the issues of the Marāṭhās, Rājpūts, and other powers. The Marāṭhās seized the important mint of Aḥmadābād in 1752; and the coins struck there in the Mug̱ẖal style (until it was closed by the British in 1835) all bear as a characteristic mark the “Ankūs,” or elephant-goad. The Peshwa also had a mint at Pūna; and numerous private mints in Mahārāsṭhra, some striking pagodas and fanams as well as rupees, were worked with or without his permission. Other Marāṭhā mints were those of the Bhonsla Rājas at Katak in Orissa and at Nāgpūr; rupees of the latter bear the mint name Sūrat. So also the Gaikwār had a mint at Baroda, Scindia at Ujjain and later on at Gwāliār, Holkār at Indor. Jaśwant Rāo Holkār issued, in 1806, a notable rupee with Sanskrit legends on both obverse and reverse (Pl. XII, 7).

Numerous Rājpūt states copied the imperial coinage in their local mints, Jaipūr (opened about 1742), Bīkāner, Jodhpūr, and many others; but in the nineteenth century the names of the ruling chiefs were substituted for that of the titular emperor. Silver and gold were struck in the emperor’s name by the Niz̤āms of Ḥaidarābād, who were content to distinguish their several issues by the addition of their initials (Pl. XII, 4) until 1857, after which the full name of the Niz̤ām took the place of the emperor’s. The Rohillas during the period of their ascendancy had a group of mints in Rohilkhand, the chief of which were Najībābād, Murādābād, Barelī and Sahāranpūr. The copper coinage of these independent states is excessively crude, and the practice of striking to local standards, which began under the later Mug̱ẖals, now became general. The copper mints were probably entirely in private hands.