The Cambridge History of India, Vol. I: Ancient India v1.c25.s1.4

v1.c25.s1.4

A few coins with the name of Alexander himself have also been classed as Indian. Thus a bronze piece, not distinguishable from his ordinary issues except that it is of squarish shape, has for many years been tacitly accepted as proof that the conqueror issued money of his own in India, conforming so far to local custom as to adopt the native fashion of striking the coins on blanks cut from oblong strips or bars. But the piece, which is now in Berlin, stands absolutely alone. Beyond the shape, there is not a particle of evidence to suggest association with the East. And closer scrutiny points to the shape being no more than an accidental freak, the result of awkward handling by some workman at a Western mint¹. A group of silver tetradrachms deserves more serious consideration. They have on the obverse a head of Zeus, and on the reverse an eagle on a thunderbolt, accompanied by the legend A (Pl. I, 14). The types are Macedonian, and the coins were long believed to be European and to represent Alexander's earliest mintage. There can, however, be little doubt that Head is right in claiming them for the East. The significance of the symbol in the field, which he was the first to recognise as a satrapal tiara, is unmistakable. Again, the only specimen whose history is known, came from Rāwalpindi, while a diobol of similar types is said to have been in the hands of a dealer in Tashkand in 1906. Finally, although the die-positions are irregular, there are points of contact with the second group of Athenian imitations described above. To say nothing of the eagle with reverted head, certain subsidiary symbols—an olive-spray with leaves and berry, and a vine-branch with grapes—are common to both; and both are apparently struck on the same abnormal standard, the average weight of three of the Macedonian tetradrachms being 217·5 grains (14·09 grammes). But, if the coins in question are Eastern, it does not follow that they are Indian. On the contrary, the evidence of provenance, slight though it be, is all in favour of Central Asia. And so, too, is that of the peculiar weight standard. When this standard next emerges in that quarter of the world, it is among coins struck by Antiochus I during his viceroyalty or, in other words, after Seleucus Nicator had formally renounced his pretensions to the Punjab as part of his bargain with Chandragupta. The inference is that the district whose needs tetradrachms of the sort were meant to meet, lay beyond the confines of India.