Chapter II: Coins of the Rājpūt Dynasties

The coins of the various Rājpūt princes ruling in Hindustān and Central India are usually gold, copper or billon, very rarely silver. The gold coins are all “_drammas_” in weight; the usual type, which appears to have been struck first by Gāṅgeya-deva Vikramāditya (1015-1040) of the Kalachuri dynasty of Ḍahāla (Jabalpūr), bears the familiar goddess (Lakshmī) on the obverse (Pl. VI, 10), with a slight deviation from the Gupta device, in that the goddess has four instead of two arms; on the reverse is an inscription giving the king’s name in old Nāgarī (Fig. 5). Of the same type are the gold coins of six Chandel kings of Mahoba (Pl. VI, 9) in Bundelkhand (circ. 1055-1280), of the Tomara dynasty of Ajmer and Dehlī (978-1128), and of the Rāṭhor kings of Kanauj (1080-1193). On the conquest of Kanauj, Muḥammad of G̱ẖ̱or actually struck a few gold pieces in this style. On the gold of the last three princes of the Kalachuri dynasty of Mahākośala, in the Central Provinces (circ. 1060-1140), a rampant lion is substituted for the seated goddess on the obverse.

The seated bull and horseman, the almost invariable devices on Rājpūt copper and billon coins, were introduced by the Brahman kings of Gandhāra, or Ohind (circ. 860-950), who first used them on silver; the commonest of these are the issues of Spalapati-deva (Pl. VI, 12) and Samanta-deva. The later coins of the dynasty, however, degenerate into billon. The name of the king in Nāgarī appears along with the bull on the reverse, and on the obverse of the Ohind coins is an inscription hitherto undeciphered, but probably in some Turanian script. Bull and Horseman coins, either copper or billon, were also struck by the Tomara and Chauhan dynasties of Dehlī (Pl. VI, 11), the Rāṭhors of Kanauj, Amṛitapāla Rāja of Budāyūn (Budāon), and the Rājpūt kings of Narwar (1220-1260; Pl. VI, 13). Some of these last, in imitation of the Muḥammadan invaders, placed dates in the Vikrama era[35] on their coins. The Narwar horseman on later coins is particularly crude in design. The Mahārājas of Kāngra continued to strike degenerate Bull and Horseman coins, from 1315 down to 1625. Deviations from this conventional type are rare. There is a unique coin of Śrī Kamāra, king of Ohind, with a lion on the obverse and a peacock on the reverse, while three kings of the same dynasty issued copper with an elephant obverse and a lion reverse.

[35] The Vikrama era starts in 58 B.C. (See page 24 ante.)

A few copper coins of the Mahākośala kings and of Jayavarma of Mahoba have a figure of Hanumān on the obverse and a Nāgarī legend on the reverse; and a similar legend takes the place of the bull on some copper pieces of Asalla-deva and Gaṇapati-deva of Narwar.