medieval islamic coin help

hey guys, i just got this medieval islamic coin...





the seller had it listed as "mamluk stultans of egypt and syria, damascus, 1341ad", but it looks like these artquid coins..

http://www.grifterrec.com/coins/islam/artuqid/artuqid4.html

so...

Nasir al-Din Artuq Arslan (1201 - 1239 AD)
AE Dirham
AH 618 (1221/1222 AD)
Obverse: Male bust facing slightly right.
Reverse: Five line Kufic legend surrounded by marginal legend.

so wikipedia hasn't cleared this up for me, the mamluks and artquids rules some of the same areas, maybe with some overalap in time...but anyway, i'm confused and not sure how to attribute this coins. any ideas?

 

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Nice lookin' coin, brother ...

Wow, you're posting ancient coins on one hand and then dealing-out German World coins on the other, eh? (well played my friend ... very well played)


:high5:

 

Tom is correct, the attribution is Artuqid.

 

I wasn't aware that Islam allowed portraits. How does this coin come to be an exception?

 

ok, thanks med....that was going to be my guess.

i was curious about this also JA, many of the artquid coins show portraits and figures (and the art is great)..if anyone knows i'd also like to hear.

yeah stevex, i have coin ADHD...i can't focus on any one thing for to long. :rolling:

 

Islam does not allow portraits on precious metal coins. Base metal coins have never had that limitation. This is why sporadically in medieval times there were non-traditional bronze islamic coins, and today many Islamic nations have portraits on their coins, since today none are PM.

 

oh..... didn't know that....now i see.

 

Btw, the often stated reference for these is Sayles' and Spengler's Turkomen Figural Bronzes. They published two volumes. A third was planned but never released. That is what S&S reference numbers refer to.

Btw its a fascinating series. Many of the types copy ancient coins. One could put together an extremely interesting collection by collecting both the Turkomen bronze, and the ancient coin it was copying. Its a very solid proof that people have been aware of, and collected, ancient coins for a long time. If not, how would someone in the 14th century know about a coin enough to copy the design?

 

I have seen similar coins from Cilicia (southern Turkey, Syria area) from the Artuqids. Funny thing, along with violating the Islamic rule about human images, some of them have the six pointed star as a border of the script, like the star of David. I can only assume that it is coincidental because Islamic artists always seem to like geometric designs, but it is interesting.

 

I think its actually the star of Solomon, followed by both jews and muslims.

 

oh yeah, i've seen those coins...they are neat.


here's a pic of an artuqid coin with the star on the reverse...not my coin (unfortunately).