Bengal AH 864 tanka
This specimen was lot 868 in Stephen Album sale 45 (Santa Rosa, CA, January 2023), where it sold for $960. The catalog description[1] noted, "BENGAL: Barbak Shah, 1459-1474, AR tanka, Dar al-Darb, AH864, complex toughra obverse, citing the ruler as abu'l-mujahid barbak shah bin mahmud shah, highly-stylized legend, with al-sultan ibn al-sultan dar al-darb 864 on the reverse, one small banker's mark on the reverse, one of the finest examples of Barbak's silver coinage, EF, RR."
Wikipedia comments,
"The Bengal Sultanate was a Sunni Muslim monarchy with Bengali, Turco-Persian, Pashtun and Abyssinian elites. The most prominent dynasties were the Ilyas Shahi, House of Ganesha and Hussain Shahi dynasty. The empire was known for its religious pluralism where non-Muslim communities co-existed peacefully. While Persian was used as the primary official, diplomatic and commercial language, it was under the Sultans that Bengali first received court recognition as an official language. The cities of the Bengal Sultanate are termed as Mint Towns where the historical taka was minted. In 1500, the royal capital of Gaur was the fifth-most populous city in the world. Other notable cities included the initial royal capital of Pandua, the economic hub of Sonargaon, the Mosque City of Bagerhat, and the seaport and trading hub of Chittagong. The Bengal Sultanate was a major trading center on the coast of the Bay of Bengal. Bengali ships and merchants traded across the region, including in Malacca, China, and the Maldives."
The Bengal sultanate was conquered by the Mughals, a process that took fifty years and was completed around 1576, when the last sultan was captured and killed at the battle of Rajmahal.
Recorded mintage: unknown but common.
Specification: silver, this specimen 10.17 g.
Catalog reference: G-500 (this piece).
- Album, Stephen, Checklist of Islamic Coins, 3rd Ed. Santa Rosa, Stephen Album Rare Coins, 2011.
- [1]Album, Stephen, Joseph Lang, Paul Montz, Michael Barry and Norman Douglas Nicol, Auction 45, Santa Rosa, CA: Stephen Album Rare Coins, Inc., 2022.
Link to:
- Bengal (1418-32) tanka, Jalal al-Din Muhammad
- Bengal AH 907 tanka, 'Ala al-din Mahmud Shah I
- Coins and currency dated 1460