History of Technology in India, Vol. I: From Antiquity to c. 1200 A.D. v1.c13.s2.t3.28

v1.c13.s2.t3.28

The use of this metal as coins has been rather late. It is only in 600 B.C. that punch marked coins have appeared and in the latter period Silver has been popular as coinage metal. In the Gupta period Copper has been deliberately added to economise the consumption of silver as well as increase the wear resistance of the coins. Kauṭilya’s Arthaśāstra gives a vivid account of minting such punch marked coins. In the latter period other coins have been produced by rolling silver pieces into sheets of uniform thickness and cutting it into equal square pieces. The identification marks were punched on these pieces and their weight was controlled by cutting away the metal from one corner. In recent years Saran (1985) and Prasad, B.(1990-91) have analysed and studied the microstructure of a number of Ag-Cu alloy coins from different heads and they found the alloy composition to be consistent in each group.