Indo-Greek coinage
The Indo-Greek coinage developed from the Greek-Bactrian coinage . The Indo-Greek Kingdom ruled the Hindu Kush and northern Pakistan from the second century BC. Until the birth of Christ. It is controversial in research whether it was a single kingdom or whether it split into several smaller kingdoms at a certain point in time. Even after the fall of the Indo-Greeks, their coinage continued to exist with the subsequent peoples.
The Indo-Greeks ruled in parts of India that had been conquered by Alexander the Great , but which after his death returned to India, especially the Maurya Empire . From the middle of the second century BC there were conquests on the part of the Greco-Bactrian kingdom . The currency of the new kingdom showed elements of the Greco-Bactrian coinage, but also those of the Maurya Empire.
Most of the coins show on the obverse the image of the ruler in a purely Hellenistic style. On the back there is an image of a deity. Inscriptions are in Greek, but there are also those in Kharoshthi script . The square shape of numerous coins has been adopted from the Maurya Empire. The gold staters of the Indo-Greeks weigh about 8.4 g and correspond to Hellenistic standards. However, the silver coins show a different weight and are often referred to as Indian tetradrachms . They weigh about 9.6 g and simple drachmas 2.4 g. They are therefore only slightly higher than the weight of the Attic hemidrachms and are based on Attic standards. The coin reforms were initiated under Apollodotos I. This coin system remained with the Indo-Scythians and the Indo-Parthians .
literature
- David W. MacDowall: The influence of Alexander the great on the coinage of Afghanistan and Northwest India. In: Jakob Ozols, Volker Thewalt (Ed.): From the East of the Alexander Empire. Peoples and cultures between Orient and Occident, Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan, India. (Festschrift for Klaus Fischer's 65th birthday). DuMont, Cologne 1984, ISBN 3-7701-1571-6 , pp. 70-72.