COINS OF ASIA

Coins of Asia Ancient Persia Achaemenids. The ancient kingdoms of the Middle EastEgyptian, Sumerian, Babylonian, Assyrian, and Hittitehad no coined money. The use of coins reached Persia from the Lydian kingdom of Croesus and the Persian satrapies of Asia Minor. The first ruler of the Achaemenid dynasty to strike coins was probably Darius I (522486 BC), as the Greek historian Herodotus suggests. The coins of the dynasty were the daric struck from gold of very pure quality and the siglos in silver; 20 sigloi (shekels) made a daric, which weighed 8.4 grams. The types of both coins were the same: obverse, the Persian king in a kneeling position holding a bow in his left hand and a spear in his right; reverse, only a rough irregular incuse caused in the striking. These roughly oval pieces were uninscribed and remained in issue unaltered in type until the fall of the empire. The issue of gold was the royal prerogative, but the conquered Greek and other cities and states were allowed to issue silver and copper, while a number of Persian satraps struck silver in their own names, producing some of the earliest and finest coin portraits. At the fall of the empire, various satraps struck silver coins of their own. Parthians Alexander's coinage and that of the Seleucids were purely Greek in character. In the mid-3rd century BC the Parthians became a great power in Persia. They had an extensive but monotonous coinage in silver (tetradrachms and drachmas) and copper. The coins do not bear the name of the issuer but that of Arsaces, which was used as a dynastic title. Some of the coins are dated in the Seleucid era; on the later coins the Greek becomes corrupt and is often joined by an inscription in Persian. Some local dynasties (e.g., of Persis and Characene), vassals of the Parthian kings, also struck coins.