Lectures on Ancient Indian Numismatics (Carmichael Lectures, 1921) c7.67

Language: English

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Here the god Rudra, to whom this hymn is addressed, is described as wearing a nishka or golden chain or necklace. But be it noted that this nishka is called viśva-rūpa. What can viśva-rūpa mean? Does it signify ‘omniform’? If so, what is meant by saying that Rudra’s necklace was omniform? I am afraid this does not convey any good sense, and we must try to find out what could be the natural and proper sense of this term? Before, however, we can hope to arrive, at any rate, at a plausible solution, we must consider the question : how could the word nishka come to signify both ‘a currency’ and a ‘necklace’? Was there in the nature of things anything common which could make any one of these senses yield the other. A little reflection will tell you that this is possible only if we suppose that Nishka means not simply ‘a currency’ but ‘a coin,’ and that Nishka denoted a necklace because it consisted of Nishkas--the coins. The practice of making necklaces out of coins is prevalent almost all over India, and is by no means unknown, I am told, even in Bengal. In Mahārāṣṭra, I know, the poorer classes get a goldsmith to cast gold coins in imitation of certain Byzantine originals which they call *puṭalyā*, which are afterwards strung into a necklace which also is called *puṭalyā*. If such is the case to this day in Mahārāṣṭra, we can easily understand how ‘a gold coin’ and ‘a necklace’ can both be called *nishka*.

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The practice of fastening coins into a necklace can by no means be regarded as a feature of modern India only, but was actually in vogue in ancient times also. Thus the Jaina canonical work entitled the *Kalpa-sūtra*,¹ which describing Śrī, the goddess of beauty, whom Triśālā, mother of Mahāvīra, saw in her dream, speaks of the former as bearing *urattha-dīnāra-mālaya*, i.e., a string of Dīnāras on her breast. Now, Dīnāra, as most of you are aware, is an Indian gold coin adopted from the Roman *denarius* during the Kushana rule in the first century A.D. And here we are told that a *mālā* or necklace was made of these gold coins and adorned the breast of the goddess Śrī. The custom of stringing coins into a necklace is thus not of modern origin, but was prevalent in ancient India also. It is, therefore, perfectly reasonable to say that ‘a necklace’ was called *nishka*, because it was made of coins called *nishkas*. *Nishka* must, therefore, be taken in the sense of ‘a coin’ and not merely of ‘a metallic currency.’ If this natural explanation is not accepted, I ask, how are you going to interpret the word *viśva-rūpa* occurring in the hymn referred to above, how can you explain satisfactorily the god Rudra’s wearing a neklace that was *viśva-rūpa*. A good sense of the term *viśva-rūpa* it is possible to fix upon, only if we admit that *nishka* means a necklace, originally at any rate, consisting of *Nishka* coins.

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The *rūpa* in *viśva-rūpa* can at once be recognised to be a word technical to the old Indian science of numismatics and denoting the symbol or figure on a coin which for that reason is styled *rūpya*. The term is met with in this technical sense not only in the early Brahmanical but also in the Buddhist literature. We shall come to know more about it in the fourth lecture of this series. But suffice it to repeat here that *rūpa* signifies a symbol or figure on a coin, and this enables us at once to perceive the significance of *viśva-rūpa*. What the seer, or rather the composer of the hymn, means is that the necklace worn by the deity Rudra was composed of *Nishka* coins, and that just because these *Nishka* coins bore various *rūpas* or figures on them, the necklace was naturally *viśva-rūpa*. The earliest of coins found in India are the punch-marked coins, and we know that no less than three hundred different devices or *rūpas* have been marked on them. No wonder if the necklace of Rudra which was made of Nishka coins is described as *viśva-rūpa*, i.e., covered with manifold *rūpas* or figures.¹ This seems to be the most natural and reasonable interpretation of the phrase *viśva-rūpa* which qualifies the term *nishka* in the sense of ‘necklace.’ And this is additional evidence to show that Nishkas were coined money and not merely metallic currency.

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In fact, unstamped metallic currency also was not unknown in the Ṛig-Vedic period, and is distinguished from the Nishkas by a distinct phraseology. Thus Maṇḍala VI contains a hymn, which is a panegyric by the Ṛishi Garga of the King Divodās, son of Śriñjaya.² In this hymn there is one Ṛik which enumerates the gifts bestowed by this king on the poet-priest. And among these mention is made of *daśa hiraṇya-piṇḍa* which the Ṛishi received. Now, what does *hiraṇya-piṇḍa* mean here? As these *hiraṇya-piṇḍas* have been specifically mentioned as ten, it appears that each *hiraṇya-piṇḍa* conformed to a definite recognised value. And as the word *piṇḍa* shows, it was bullion beaten into somewhat definite, *i.e.*, probably roundish, shape. The *hiraṇya-piṇḍas*, which the seer Garga received, appear, therefore, to be buttons of gold which passed as unstamped money in the Ṛig-Vedic period. Of course, there is nothing strange in both stamped and unstamped money circulating in one and the same period. Not many years ago, as you will recollect, the Ḍhābuās, which were unstamped copper coins, circulated freely in Bengal along with stamped coinage of various denominations. We need not, therefore, be surprised, if we find from the Ṛig-veda that both *hiraṇya-piṇḍas* and Nishkas, *i.e.*, unstamped and stamped money, were current at one and the same time.