The Coinage of the Gupta Empire and its Imitations c7.s1.21

c7.s1.21

Kumāragupta I had a long reign (c. 414—455 A. D.), which was mostly prosperous, and the number of types of his gold coinage is equal to the types issued by his father and grand-father put together. So far he is known to have issued as many as 14 different types and it is not impossible that some more may be discovered. The Archer (Pl. IX. 10-14), the Horseman (Pl. X. 11-15), the Lion-slayer (Pl. XII. 1-10), and the Chhatra (Pl. XIII. 15) types, which were most popular in the preceeding reign, were continued by him. His Chhatra type is, however, very scarce. He revived the Aśvamedha, the Lyrist and the Tiger-slayer types of his grand-father and the King-and-Queen type of his great-grand-father (Pl. XIII. 7-10; Pl. XIV. 5; Pl. XII. 11-13; Pl. XIV. 4). He also introduced several new types. His Kārttikeya type (Pl. XIII. 11-14) is a numismatic homage to the deity after whom he was named; his Swordsman type (Pl. XI. 14-15) is probably due to his being well-known as a swordsman. In the field of sport he devised three new types, the Elephant-rider (Pl. XII. 14-15), the Rhinoceros-slayer (Pl. XIII. 3-6) and the Elephant-rider-Lion-slayer types (Pl. XIII. 1-2). The mystery of the type where he is seen standing with his arms folded on his chest is still unsolved (Pl. XIV. 1-3). For the sake of convenience it was once described as ‘Pratāpa’ type on account of the legend on the reverse; this legend, however, is now seen to be apratigha. We may therefore call it Apratigha type, till its mystery is solved.