The Princeton Encyclopedia of Islamic Political Thought

coinage

Before the spread of machine-struck coinage in the Islamic world in the 19th century, the coins of Muslim states were prepared by hand, as individual bits of metal were struck between two dies, resulting in the transfer of the design of those dies to the two faces of the coin. These coins, which varied tremendously in size and shape over the chronological span and geographical scope of the Muslim world, were usually prepared from gold, silver, or copper. While the main purpose of coins is economic, they are also intimately linked to matters of politics. The common words in Arabic for gold coin (dīnār) and silver coin (dirham) appear in the Qur’an, and Muslim jurists subsequently wrote treatises establishing Islamic principles of money and the need for those in authority to provide proper coinage. The two faces of coins, moreover, proved to be excellent vehicles for political messages.

It is thus not surprising that the right to mint coins (sikka) emerged as one of two major prerogatives of rulership in the premodern Islamic world. The other was the right to have one’s name mentioned as ruler in the Friday sermon (khuṭba).

There was no tradition of coin minting in the early Islamic community of the Hijaz. Thus as the first Muslims expanded outside of the Arabian Peninsula, they simply adopted the coinage in use by the states they conquered. It was not until the year 696 that what may be called the first Islamic coinage was produced during the reign of the Umayyad caliph ‘Abd al-Malik (r. 685–705). These were gold coins that bore only writing, in this case legends derived from Qur’anic verses and other pious phrases. Two years later, silver dirhams were struck bearing similar legends. Beginning in the reign of the Abbasid caliph Mu‘tasim (r. 833–42), the names of the caliphs were added to the coin legends. While the subsequent breakup of the Abbasid state resulted in the emergence of several other styles and types of coins, from this point in the ninth century onward, coins became a major source of political history for the Muslim world. As local autonomy developed in the farther reaches of the Abbasid Empire, provincial governors began to add their names to the coins minted in the regions under their control. Changes in these names reflect either a change in the ruler or a change in the dynasty. With the rise of the competing caliphates of the Fatimids and the Spanish Umayyads, coins were struck in the names of those respective leaders as well. The Fatimids not only changed the layout and design of their coinage but also used Shi‘i phrases in their coin legends. Changes in legends and titles often reflected immediate political circumstances. The Mamluk sultan Malik al-Zahir Baybars (r. 1260–77), for example, added the title “supporter of the Commander of the Faithful” (qasīm amīr al-mu’minīn) to some of his gold coins to reflect his establishment of a new Abbasid caliphate in Cairo after the Mongols had destroyed Baghdad in 1258.

While never as common as the purely scriptural coin designs, figural imagery and symbols appear on some coins minted by Muslim states, although the reason is not always clear. Baybars had a feline figure engraved on his gold and silver coins, possibly a reference to the fact that his name meant “panther” in his native tongue. In states as diverse as the Turkoman dynasties of northern Mesopotamia in the 12th century and Mughal India in the 17th century, images linked to astrological concepts were used on coins, although in the former case that astrological link is fiercely debated. Finally, while coins with images become slightly more prevalent with the spread of modern machine-struck coinage, some modern Muslim states such as Saudi Arabia continue in the long established pattern of epigraphic coinage established long ago by ‘Abd al-Malik.

See also trade and commerce