Story of Indian Money Part IV

Post-Mauryan period of Indo-Greek influence (180 B.C. – 55 B.C.)

The Mauryan Empire which ruled large parts of the Indian sub-continent as a central authority declined around 180 B.C. leading to the fragmentation of the country’s polity into successor states that were based on tribal allegiance, older clans, oligarchies and newer trade guild states.
However, another political development was the emergence of a strong Greek state called Bactria around 250 B.C. north of Hindu Kush which spread to North-western India around 180 B.C. under King Demetrius I. This led to the founding of a new kingdom referred as the ‘Indo-Greek Kingdom’ by modern historians.
The 30-odd Indo-Greek kings, who issued India’s first coinage based on Classical Greek coinage, are known by their coins only. Their coins were generally struck by employing the Western ‘die-striking’ technique and had the portrait of the ruler on the obverse with inscribed titles of the ruler along with the image of a Greek deity on the reverse.
Demetrius I issued a unique coin with his portrait with an elephant’s scalp on his head portraying after the subduing of the Indians under their local ruler, Sophagasegnus (Shubhagasena?) in Kabul valley in 180 B.C.
Demetrius went on to issue a bilingual coinage using Greek script on obverse and North-Western Indian script of Kharosthi on the reverse; making it the first Indian coin inscribed in a local Indian script. His successors, Agathocles and Pantaleon who ruled the kingdom jointly issued a bilingual coin using Greek and the North Indian script of Brahmi which was prevalent throughout the Indian sub-continent since Ashoka’s period when he used it on his famous pillars to issue his edicts on Buddhism throughout his realm.

The Indo-Greeks also introduced a new weighing system called the Attic system which used multiples of 4 grams instead of the ratti system. Their coins were more sophisticated and circular in shape; using real life portraits of the rulers in conjunction with images of deities to confer legitimacy on the rulers.

The Indo-Greek coinage influenced later Indian rulers to use portrait images and deity images to convey their religious beliefs to the common public. Agathocles issued a bilingual coin with the images of Vasudeva and Sankarshana (Krishna and Balarama) on either side making it the first Indian coin to feature Indian deities!
Thus, the Indo-Greek numismatic legacy lingered in the Indian sub-continent for a long time as later Indian kings used the Indo-Greek prototype of the portrait of the king on the obverse and a favoured deity on the reverse for their coinage inspired by the example of the Indo-Greeks who were in turn inspired by their Mediterranean counterparts.
The bilingual script on coinage was also adapted by later foreign rulers like the Kushans to convey their regal authority over their subjects in a vernacular language and script. This concept has prevailed till modern times as the coins of Republic of India have legends in both Devanagari used to write India’s national language Hindi and Roman for English!
Thus, the Indo-Greek period left an indelible mark upon the numismatic traditions of the Indian sub-continent long after the disappearance of the Indo-Greek kingdom.

Images: Left Obv: Menander's Portrait with Greek legend 'Basileus Soteroy Menander' 'King Saviour Menander'
Right Rev: Image of Zeus with thunderbolt and incomplete Kharosthi legend 'Maharajasa Tratarasa..

Image courtesy: National Museum, New Delhi, India

Story of Indian Money Part III

The Iron Age (Vedic, Post-Vedic and Early Buddhist era ~ 1500 B.C. - 500 B.C.)

The period following Harappan civilisation’s decline was the Iron Age period of early Vedic civilisation when the Rig Veda was first composed around 1500 B.C. on the banks of River Saraswati. The Vedic people were pastoralists by profession and hence the cow formed an important form of currency for storage of value and large exchanges like royal estate, donation to the Brahmans for Yagnas, etc. References to cow as wealth is seen in the multiple terms derived from the cow in the Vedic literature like Gou Puccha (lit. cow’s tail being handed to a new owner), Gowdhar (Village headman) Duhhitri (synonym for daughter and one who milks the cow), Gaavishthi (cattle raids by enemy tribes),etc.
Gou Puccha was the first reference to accounting in the Veda of commodities i.e. a king/priest’s wealth indicated by the number of Gou Pucchhas. This concept in combination to branding of cows was later extrapolated to the official stamping of coins for ensuring authenticity of coins issued by the state.
The later Vedas mention the use of gold and silver in form of Hiranya pinda and Rupakas for transactions. A verse in the Yajurveda mentions the sale of Soma (wine) against gold pieces called Candra (pl. Candrani) and its lower denominations called Pada meaning feet of the cow (equivalent to the quarter of a cow) and Safa meaning the hooves of the cow (equivalent to one-eighth of a cow). The later writings speak of other types of gold coins called the Nishka, Suvarna and Shatamana. However, no existing samples of these coins have been found leading to the inference that these coins were probably unstamped ingots of gold exchanged for their intrinsic value.

The late Vedic period (8th century B.C.-6th century B.C.) and early Buddhist period (6th century B.C. – 5th century B.C.) saw the rise of newer political units called the Janapadas (Jana ~ People Pada~ Foot) that rose in various parts of India and issued India’s first ever coinage in silver. Each Janapada issued a unique coinage with varied symbols punched on the coin as a symbol of its sovereignty. These coins are thus called ‘Punch Marked Coins’ by modern numismatists named after the unique technique of using multiple punches to strike various symbols on the coins.
The Janapadas merged into sixteen larger units referred to as Solasa Mahajanapadas in the Buddhist and Jain texts; these were Anga (Bengal and east Bihar) Ashmaka or Kuntala (modern Andhra Pradesh), Avanti (Ujjain), Chhedi (Bundelkhand), Dakshina and Uttar Panchala (the Gangetic Doab), Gandhara (N-W Afghanistan), Kamboja (Hindukush region), Kashi (Varanasi), Koshala (Ayodhya-Faizabad region), Kuru (Delhi and surrounding areas), Magadha (south Bihar and East Bengal), Matsya (modern Jaipur and Alwar districts of Rajasthan), Malla (modern Gorakhpur in eastern U.P. and parts of Nepal), Shurasena (Mathura region) and Vrijji (North Bihar).

The Punch-marked coins are found all over the country and each region issued a unique type of Punch-marked coin for circulation in its jurisdiction.
The Punch-marked coins were essentially pieces of silver cut from metal sheets, weighed and punched with particular symbols unique to the Janapada issuing it; hence these pieces were rectangular or square shaped. Additionally, Punch-marked coins were uninscribed in nature i.e. without written legends in any script to provide details of their exact origin.
For e.g. Gandhara Janapada in the North-West Afghanistan issued a very typical silver Punch-marked coin called the ‘Silver Bent Bar’ coin by modern numismatists that has a typical long bar of silver weighing around 11 grams with punch marks of a six-armed symbol called Shadachakra on the either ends of the obverse (‘heads’ end) side. Additionally the bar is slightly bent giving coin a concave surface on the obverse side.
Other Janapadas like Ashmaka/Kuntala (parts of Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh) issued punch marks of a unique double-pulley symbol. Most of the coins have numerous symbols ranging from two to four stamped on its obverse sides. The reverse (‘tails’ end) side have no symbols except for small marks called ‘Shroff marks’ made by traders to authenticate the coin for general circulation.

The Punch-marked coins are referred as Karshapanas (Kahapanas in Pali) in Buddhist literature like Jataka tales and Jain literature of the ancient period. The most famous tale of Buddha’s foremost disciple Anathapindika, a merchant who purchased a garden called Jetavana for his Master by covering its entire floor with silver Kahapanas amounting to an astounding sum of eighteen crore rupees!
Interestingly, the Roman historian Quintus Curtius refers to presentation of 80 talents of stamped silver ‘signati argenti’ to Alexander by the Indian king Oomphis (Ambhi) signalling the presence of Indian silver currency during Alexander’s invasion of Indus region in 326 B.C.
The smaller units of Karshapana existed in binary denominations ranging from half to 1/32th part of Karshapana and are called Ardha Panas, Pada Pana, Dvi-Mashaka, Mashaka and Kakani. These lower units were minted with copper to reduce the inherent value of the currency. According to the Arthashastra, a labourer was paid a mashaka (1/16th Karshapana) as a day’s wages during the Mauryan period!

Thus, the period saw the actual use of precious metal as coins which began a new phase in Indian History. Trade and economy were boosted by the use of coins which were measurable units of exchange leading to increased prosperity and welfare. However, Indian coins were used by the very wealthy only as is evident from the large hoards of these punchmarked coins found through the length and breadth of the Indian subcontinent. Money thus finally acquired a definite form at the end of this period and progressively became a tool of state power.
These early coins are believed to have been issued by a large number of traders or their guilds initially; only later did the state evince an interest in controlling their issue.
The varieties of punchmarked coins point to a number of states called Mahajanapadas (Great People's states) which soon combined under the power of the Magadha Empire in 4th Century B.C. under the Mauryas. The Mauryan Imperial issues which are found all over the sub-continent till Mysore in South India have five punch marks (impressed symbols)in contrast to other local issues which have one to four punchmarks only. These imperial coins are more numerous and less damaged indicating a wider and later issuing by the authorities.
The coins may have been issued as early as eigth century B.C. but most possibly their issuing was around 5th century B.C. as suggested by numerous Buddhist and Jaina scriptures.

Thus, Punch marked coinage represents the earliest Indian coinage with their unique shapes and sizes attesting to an indigenous evolution as opposed to a Persian inspiration as suggested by numerous Western scholars.

The Story of Indian Money

The Story of Indian Money Part II

The Harappan era (Mature phase ~ 3500 B.C. – 1900 B.C.)

The Origins of Money are vitally linked to three important factors; one, the beginning of cities, and the second, trade including within the city and outside its environs.

The third and the most important factor was the beginning of Man’s ability to count objects and thus maintain accounts. The earliest form of writing is not historical or poetic or literary material but accounts of traders!

This is true of all ancient civilizations like the Sumerian, Indus (Harappan) or the Chinese where writing symbols were invented initially to maintain accounts of trade.

The next phase in the Indian sub-continent’s development was the beginning of the Harappan civilisation around 3500 B.C in the North-Western and Western region of the Indian sub-continent popularly dubbed as India’s first urbanisation era by modern historians.

The Harappan civilisation was indeed India’s first tryst with urban culture and international trade. The Harappan people traded with the Mesopotamian people extensively as evidenced by exchange of pottery, seals and other objects through middlemen from Dilmun (modern Bahrain).

The Harappans evolved newer scientific advances like metallurgical objects, exact weighing system, innovative ship-building techniques, cities with advanced municipal sewage systems and multi-storeyed brick houses; however, not much has been discovered about their exact medium of exchange for their ‘international’ transactions.

The theory that Harappan seals were currency has been discounted by eminent scholars. Alternatively, it has been suggested that the presence of huge ‘granaries’ (probably owned by the state) may have been the ‘storehouses of value and wealth’ in the Harappan economy. Like many other aspects of the Harappan civilisation, Harappan currency remains one of the greatest enigmas that defy logic and solution.

However, the presence of some form of currency is most plausible thanks to the presence of exact weights. The Harappan weights were found in Bahrain in modern excavations in recent times suggesting that the weights were uniform in the two regions and used to quantify the buying and selling of trade goods between the two people.

Another pointer to a Harappan currency is the Harappan familiarity with the use of gold for ornamentation. Thus, Harappan currency may have been bullion most probably gold as gold objects are common in Harappan sites as opposed to silver.

Thus, Harappan era represents a monetary puzzle in the history of Indian money due to lack of definite evidence of a Harappan currency. However, other evidences like organized weight system, familiarity with gold as a precious commodity and a sophisticated system of trading point to the existence of a definite form of exchange system in the period.

(To be continued)

The Story of Indian Money

The Story of Indian Money – Part I

The recent excitement about the new symbol for the Indian Rupee created a huge tsunami of excitement in the Indian media as it symbolized India’s rise in the hierarchy of the select group of nations with similar privileges.

However, the event also brought the focus on the antiquity of Indian money and most newspapers scrambled for more information on this neglected topic in Indian History.

Hurried research by columnists made us faintly aware of the creation of the Indian denomination ‘Rupaiya’ or the modern Rupee during Sher Shah Suri’s reign clearly overlooking that the word ‘Rupaiya’ came from a more ancient Sanskrit term ‘Rupa’ meaning an image impressed on a metal.In India, like everywhere else, the idea of ‘money’ did not evolve overnight and had to undergo a parallel evolution with humans’ growth from pre-historic barbarians to the comfort-seeking creatures of today.

India has the longest and unbroken tradition of monetary evolution stretching three millennia or more and its money underwent dynamic changes with the rise and fall of numerous kingdoms and dynasties in the Indian sub-continent. Hence, the study of Indian money is essentially a kaleidoscopic study of the Indian civilisation itself in its varied hues.

The Pre-historic era (2.6 million years ago - 5000 B.C.)

The Indian sub-continent has seen continuous human occupation right from the beginning of of Stone Age’s hunter-gatherer stage (2.6 million years ago) into a settled human existence supported by farming and animal domestication during the Neolithic period (~ 8000 B.C.) Running parallel to this evolution has been the growth of human capability of trading beginning in the Palaeolithic Era (2.6 million years- 12000 B.C.) with simple barter of edible goods against stone tools and weapons. Indian archaeologists have found evidences of such exchanges in the form of ‘factory sites’ of tools which suggest mass production of stone tools for bartering.

The succeeding periods of prehistoric era viz. Mesolithic Era (12000 B.C. – 8000 B.C.) and Neolithic Era (8000 B.C. – 5000 B.C.) saw more sophistication in barter system with the evolution of primitive money in the form of ‘money objects’.

This is suggested by hoards of ‘money objects’ like arrow heads, iron filings, bead money, copper implements and cowry shells (in lands far away from the sea) found all over India’s numerous pre-historic sites. Archaeologists have inferred that these objects were used to ‘buy’ other valuable objects since they were perceived as ‘valuable’ by the primitive people. Thus, the pre-historic period helped train humans in the essential art of mutual exchange. However, the period was interspersed with sporadic violence over the ‘perceived inequities’ fostered by this primitive trading.

The major drawback of barter, though it survived for a long long time, was the excessive reliance on a mutual need for exchange between the concerned individuals; a condition that made trading a probable cause for strife in pre-historic society.

Barter objects are found often in archaeological excavations spanning all periods especially the prehistoric era. One famous example is the Copper Hoards found in Central India where Copper tools of various types are found huddled in form of a typical factory site. The British Museum's Coin Gallery exhibits a typical Copper hoard found from Ghungeria, Madhya Pradesh as an example of this prehistoric culture.

Thus, the idea of money in this primitive period thus centred upon exchange of metallic objects either in form of domestic or mechanical tools or weapons for self defence in exchange for other goods.

(To be continued)

Britain's numismatic panaroma and dilemma

I have spent the last week sorting out modern British coinage in the cosmopolitan city of London and couldn't help making some wry observations.

I discovered that apart from the decimal system of the Brish Pound coin, 1p, 2p, 10p 20p 50p and so on, the coinage of United Kingdom features a myriad of symbolic representations of the federal regions of England, Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales.

Despite a national competition for designing a new coinage in 2008 with a new concept of using the British Shield in bits and parts, its pre-2008 coins merrily circulate till this day carrying symbols of the Celtic Cross representing Northern Ireland (see picture on left), the Welsh Dragon representing Wales, the Rampant Lion symbol of Scotland, and the Three Passant Lions (three lions appearing together which also appears on the British Shield) representing England. There exists a set of floral representations of these regions which I shall illustrate later.

The old 50 Pence coins feature Brittania the physical manifestation of Britain much akin to India's Bharat Mata.

However, the obverse is much staid and traditional with a bust of Queen Elizabeth II with her regnal titles in Latin as Defender of the faith with the year of issue.

Moreover, the switchover to the new coins hasn't been smooth as the British Shield doesn't have any representation of Wales; also the new coins are a post-modern artistic representation whose significance is not observed by the majority.

My take is that if coinage is drastically changed, its symbolic representation has to be made with more popular designs than modern artistic standards which is not appreciated by the common man. New coins pose problems everywhere but their acceptance is gradual and an over the time affair. Strangely, I have not come across any new coins here and many Indian colleagues I spoke to think these old coins are the only ones that exist in U.K.!

The British establishment battling recession can do little to assuage these numismatic grouses especially since redesigning the coins will drain its coffers unnecessarily. Hence, I believe it has taken no cognizance of this issue. The 2 pound coins are less controversial featuring Darwin and an ape to represent the 200th anniversary of the great man in 2009.

If we were to apply the British style of symbolic representation to Indian states, there would be absolute chaos. Imagine having twenty eight types of coins with as many symbols on the reverse of the Indian rupee. India's numismatic problems have been lessened by simple adoption of the Ashoka Chakra which is a fairly ancient symbol to arouse any modern sectarian grouses.

East African 5 Cent Coin: Relic of India's Kenyan Connexion

For the Gen X, geopolitical entities like East Africa cut no ice, but it was a vital region of economic activity in the nineteenth and twentieth century with the major European powers vying for their share in the precious pie. East Africa comprising of a large tract of land with vital deposits of mineral ore, tea and coffee plantations. The Portuguese were one of the first colonial powers setting up their base in Mozambique in the fifteenth century, while the French set up their trading station at Madagascar; the Germans had their interests in Zanzibar while the British turned to the region only in the late nineteenth century with the forming of East African Protectorate in 1880s roughly comprising of present day Kenya.
By the end of the nineteenth century, Indian immigrants chiefly from Gujarat swarmed the region as indentured labourers initially, battling discriminatory measures like segregation in ghettos, commercial restrictions to pursue a variety of professions like money lending, trading and artistic/manual professions in the protectorate’s cities and towns. Eventually, they outnumbered Europeans by two to one in 1919.

Delving into my collections, I came across a Five Cent coin from East Africa issued in 1941, in the middle of the Second World War when British were busy fighting the Axis Powers to defend their turfs in Asia and Africa desperately. The coin’s obverse has ‘East Africa’ inscribed with the denomination in a staid manner but the reverse has the imperial designations of George V in Latin as ‘GEORGIVS V REX ET IND: IMP:’ meaning ‘George V King and Emperor India’.
Thus, the coin is of dual importance to India, one as its historical context speaks of a lost homeland for many expatriate Indians whose forefathers had to leave East Africa (Kenya) in the 1960s in the wake of blatant racial discrimination practised by the ruling Kenyan government and the coin's statement of George V as Emperor of India. The coin is a vital material evidence of a lost era of colonial domination which was soon challenged all over the globe; escalated by the post-world war confusion faced by the European authorities back home. Thus, these colonial coins are a vital part of our heritage and important tools in recreation of lost historical and geopolitical entities which no longer exist for the younger generations.

A Greek Tragedy of an extinct Drachma Coin reminiscing ancient Hellenic glory with Aristotle’s image

Greece has been the centre of a ancient Hellenic civilization which spread all over the known world in wake of the rise of Alexander of Macedonia in the fourth century B.C.; spreading it right from Greece to Persia, Egypt, Central Asia right till the North-West frontier of the Indian subcontinent as a direct result of Alexander's expansionist campaign.

There was significant change in the world of Numismatics in the wake of Alexander’s campaign when many states began adopting the Greek Attic standard of drachms (one drachm approx. 4.37 gm) under the aegis of the Seleucid Empire which rose after Alexander's death across these territories.

India too adopted the drachm as a unit of its numismatic weight system first under the Kushans (1st Century to 3rd Century A.D.) who replaced the Indo-Greek rulers of the North-Western India and then under the Imperial Gupta dynasty in the 4th Century A.D.
The drachma survived as a name of a unit of coin weight in most Indian languages till the early medieval period as ‘dramma’ which was eventually corrupted to ‘daam’ during Akbar’s reign (r.1556-1605) till it became the term for the price of an item in later day Hindi.
Thus, the Greek drachma played a seminal role in the evolution of coins of the world in its initial gestational period.

Cut to the twenty-first century, Greece is a modern state with a flourishing economy benefitting from its shipping industry, tourism, exports, etc. However, the Greek economy has seen its economy floundering under the worst ever crisis in 2009-10 causing it to lean on more prosperous and stable members of the European Union and earning their ire. Worse still, today Greece doesn’t even have its own independent currency, the Euro having replaced the indigenous drachma in 2001. This sad state of affairs is similar to Alexander's expansionism albeit the expansion is under the European Union engulfing the first super state of European civilisation, Greece.

I came across a 5 Drachma coin in my collection having inscriptions in Greek alphabet on its obverse (image on left) written from 7’0 Clock position as
‘ΕΛΛHNIKH ΔHMOKPATIA’ read as ELLENIKE DEMOKRATIA in Roman alphabet meaning ‘Hellenic Republic’ Greece’s official name today.
The centre has its denomination written as ‘5 DPAXMAI’ read as ‘5 DRACHMAI’ in Roman alphabet or plainly 5 Drachma. The date of the coin is given as 1976.

The reverse (image on right) has the image of Greek polymath, Aristotle who amongst his many other interests was also a student of another great Greek philosopher, Plato and a teacher to Alexander of Macedon. The Greek legend on the coin is spelt as
‘APIΣTOTEΛHΣ’ transliterated as ‘ARISTOTELES’ in Roman alphabet or plain ‘ARISTOTLES’

The Drachma was revived with the establishment of the modern state of Greece in 1832 and was issued in three different phases between the two world wars. The third phase coincided with Greece’s domestic crisis in the form of the rule of a military junta between 1967 and 1974.

In 1976, after the fall of the military junta and the installation of a new parliament of the Hellenic Republic, a new series of eight denomination coins carrying images of ancient heroes of the Greek nation was issued and this tiny cupro-nickel coin was a part of that historic series. Hence, this coin today represents a crisis in the world of coins where larger economic interests are subsuming indigenous coinage at a very large cost of loss of national and cultural identities.

A Pan-Asian currency, anyone?