The Coinage of the Gupta Empire and its Imitations c9.s1.7

c9.s1.7

The close resemblance, which the Standard type bears to its prototype, has been already discussed (p. 30). It is however necessary to draw attention to the conscious effort that the mint-masters were making to Indianise the type. The Kuṣāṇa peaked head-dress is replaced by a close-fitting cap, decorated in the Hindu fashion by a pearl-border (Pl. II. 2. 5). Triśūla (trident) in front of the king is replaced by a Garuḍa banner which was the insignia of the Guptas.¹ Above all, the corrupt and unmeaning Greek legend on the obverse is replaced by a Sanskrit metrical inscription in Brāhmī characters. Perhaps the only remnant of the Greek legend may be detected in a solitary crescent, that we sometimes see near the Garuḍa-standard or over the king’s head (Pl. I. 15; II. 1). The crescent may, however, not be the remnant of a Greek letter and have had its own significance, because the crescent-standard appears on many types (cf. Pl. I. 8; III. 3; III. 13). The Greek legend Ardoxsho, which appears on some of the coins of the late Kushāṇa type (Pl. I. 3), has been replaced by the Brāhmī legend Parākramaḥ, giving the biruda of the emperor. It is clear that the Gupta mint-masters were trying to nationalise the foreign type as much as numismatic conservatism would permit. The workmanship of their coins is also much superior to that of their prototype. The metal is almost pure gold, with an alloy of about 10% only, instead of about 50% which was in the late Kushāṇa coins.