Lectures on Ancient Indian Numismatics (Carmichael Lectures, 1921) c10.33

c10.33

Now just one or two points before closing this history of the Kārshāpaṇa coinage. I have already stated on the authority of Kātyāyana that Māsha also known as Paṇa was not one-sixteenth but one-twentieth part of Kārshāpaṇa. Now, epigraphists need not be told that there is such a coin as Viṃśopaka mentioned in inscriptions of the mediæval period and found in such provinces as Rājputānā, Central India and the Dekkan.¹ Numismatists have no doubt been telling us that it is one-twentieth part of some coin. But all this is vague information. Had we not rather say that it denoted the Paṇa or Māsha coin which forms one-twentieth part of Kārshāpaṇa?