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Minerals and Metals in Ancient India v1.c28.s7.t1: Punch-Marked Coins

Minerals and Metals in Ancient India v1.c28.s7.t1

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Punch-Marked Coins

v1.c28.s7.t1.1

Small sheets or strips receiving one punch or a few successive punches on one side may be defined as ‘punch-marked’ coins. The sophisticated die-struck coins received punches from both sides simultaneously.

v1.c28.s7.t1.2

Dikshit (1981) reported on the overlooked silver pieces, some flat, circular, square and rectangular, found in a silver vase from the DK area in Mohenjo-Daro. He submitted that these pieces were ‘the precursors of punch-marked coins of later times’. Comparing the weights, Mukherjee (1988: 54) came to the same conclusion that the pieces could be related to standard cubical weights found at the Indus sites and therefore belonged to a metallic currency system. There was alphabetic cuneiform script on one of the pieces which must have been imported from Ur, Mesopotamia around 2000-1700 BC. The expression *manā hiraṇyayā* in *Ṛgveda*, 8.78.2 could have an allusion to the Babylonian weight called *minā*. The *Ṛgveda* (1.56.2; 1.126.2; 4.24.9-10; 5.19.3; 8.47.15) contains many references to *niṣka* or monetary currency of noble metals. Post-Vedic literatures refer to gold pieces, *śatamāna* etc. Pāṇini’s *Aṣṭādhyāyī* refers to *rūpya-rūpa* and Kauṭilya’s *Arthaśāstra* to *tāmra-rūpa* meaning punch-marked silver and copper coins respectively. Archeological data corroborate the literary evidences.

v1.c28.s7.t1.3

The hoard of coins unearthed at Bhir Mound, Taxila contained 1055 punch-marked pieces of the older type, 33 long bent-bar coins, 79 minute coins, 2 pieces of Alexander the Great, an Achaemeninan siglos, but not a single die-struck coin. On this basis Mukherjee (1988: 12 and 67) has argued that around fourth century BC the coins in vogue were punch-marked and die-struck ones. The Chaman-i-Hazuri hoard in the Kabul area suggests that the punch-marked and saucer-shaped pieces were in circulation even in the fifth century BC.

v1.c28.s7.t1.4

The punch-marked pieces bearing 5 symbols and struck on the standard of 32 *raktikās* (or 57.2 grains) have been unearthed from different parts of the subcontinent and must have been issued by the Nandas and the Mauryas. The *signati argenti* presented by the king of Taxila to Alexander the Great were stamped or punch-marked silver coins.

v1.c28.s7.t1.5

The tradition of die-struck coins must have been initiated around third century BC under the foreign influence specially at Taxila. During this time we find the obverse die-struck copper coin of Dharmapāla at Eran, Madhya Pradesh.

Cites (5)