The Cambridge History of India, Vol. I: Ancient India v1.c24.s1.2

v1.c24.s1.2

The standard gold coin of Ancient Persia was the daric, which bore upon the obverse a figure of the Great King hastening through his dominions, armed with bow and spear; and upon the reverse an irregular oblong incuse. It weighed about 130 grains (8·42 grammes), and was in all probability first minted by Darius Hystaspes, the monarch who was responsible for adding the valley of the Indus to the empire. From its infancy, therefore, the daric would have ready access to the country beyond the Hindu Kush. At the same time there was an important economic reason which would militate against its extensive circulation in these regions. Gold was abundant there, so abundant that for many centuries its value relatively to silver was extraordinarily low. There are grounds for believing that during the period of the Persian dominion the ratio was no higher than 1:8, as compared with the norm of 1:13·3 maintained by the imperial mint. Such darics as made their way thither would thus constitute an artificially inflated currency, and would tend to be exported again on the earliest possible opportunity. There was no temptation to accumulate them, when they could be exchanged elsewhere for silver at so very substantial a profit. The conclusion here suggested is fully borne out by the actual phenomena. Persian gold has never been discovered in any quantity in India; the hoards of ‘darics’ sometimes said to have been found in the eighteenth century can be shown to have consisted of Gupta coins. Isolated examples have, indeed, been picked up sporadically; the daric reproduced on Pl. I, 1, is from the Cunningham Collection. But it is significant that in no single instance do these bear countermarks or any other indication that could possibly be interpreted as suggestive of a prolonged Indian sojourn.