Satya sai's wealth was still a national debate and media was speculating the actual numbers. Soon came the news of Padmanabha swamy temple's treasure. Still one chamber is to be opened. This incredible wealth could buy nations or eradicate poverty for a change. Mere seeing the pictures of Padmanabha swamy's wealth in chain mails made me go dizzy. It was so overwhelming that even I wanted to open some treasure desperately. Off I went to open the only treasure I have, some petty coins I have collected since childhood. Not very long ago I had added some coins from my brother's collection. I was not very familiar with the recent additions. So here I was looking at each coin carefully and dreaming how Padmanabha swamy temple officials would chase me to exchange the coins with the temple's treasures and how I would refuse. Nice dream !!
Most of my collection is made of coins from 80's and 90's. Some of pre-independence era. Few international coins and one or two dating back to 1850's East India Company coins. one coin has Urdu or Arabic all over it and I cannot make head or tail out it.
One particular coin left me clueless. Looking at it gives an ancient feel to it. Date is not there, if it was there it is completely wiped out. Script on it is Devanagari but nothing is readable. Portrayals on it resembled Hindu rulers. So I expected it to be a pre-British era coin. I wanted to know more about it and I couldn't keep it out of my mind. After one or two days when I was discussing coins with my friends this came up. One friend when he saw it next day, suggested it could be a coin from Nepal. Hence my search started with Nepal coins. There were many interesting coins but nothing similar came out. I went back to my original assumption and started looking in pre-British era coins. List was too big to search from. Nothing was remotely matching and it was leading nowhere. I had to change my search strategy. Took a long look at the coin and typed what I was seeing, `person holding trishul`, `Shiva with trishul` and some other combinations. Some of the search combinations lead me back to Nepal coins. But that was not what I was looking for. I flipped the coin where it had four persons. So guessing wildly I typed `coins with Rama and his brothers`. Bingo!! It led me to what I was looking but not exactly the same. It was an Aha moment and I was amazed to see what I was looking for. I would have definitely refused to exchange the coin for world's treasures at that moment.
So what I had with me was a coin or sometimes called temple token known as Rama Tanka. I started to like this name as well. It is Rama and Lakshmana on one side which I had mistook for Shiva and Parvathi looking at what looked like a Trishul. On the other side it is the Rama darbar. I had not at all noticed the Hanuman until I looked at the pictures. Stupid of me to have missed it.
Rama Tanka is supposed to be worshipped in Hindu households to celebrate the legend of Rama and passed on to next generations. There are genuine ancient coins and modern reproductions. Mine looks like a modern reproduction, but I am not sure. I had never seen a Rama Tanka or heard about it before. When I searched for Rama Tanka I could find a very similar coin to that of mine. I am still clueless about the exact date when this was minted and I have no idea how to figure it out also. On the whole, Searching wildly without knowing what I had with me and discovering it as Rama Tanka was a liberating experience.
Referred links:
http://www.coinquest.com/cgi-bin/cq/coins?main_coin=521&main_ct_id=54
http://psrraju1953.blogspot.com/2010/09/rama-tanka-coins-hstory.html
Most of my collection is made of coins from 80's and 90's. Some of pre-independence era. Few international coins and one or two dating back to 1850's East India Company coins. one coin has Urdu or Arabic all over it and I cannot make head or tail out it.
One particular coin left me clueless. Looking at it gives an ancient feel to it. Date is not there, if it was there it is completely wiped out. Script on it is Devanagari but nothing is readable. Portrayals on it resembled Hindu rulers. So I expected it to be a pre-British era coin. I wanted to know more about it and I couldn't keep it out of my mind. After one or two days when I was discussing coins with my friends this came up. One friend when he saw it next day, suggested it could be a coin from Nepal. Hence my search started with Nepal coins. There were many interesting coins but nothing similar came out. I went back to my original assumption and started looking in pre-British era coins. List was too big to search from. Nothing was remotely matching and it was leading nowhere. I had to change my search strategy. Took a long look at the coin and typed what I was seeing, `person holding trishul`, `Shiva with trishul` and some other combinations. Some of the search combinations lead me back to Nepal coins. But that was not what I was looking for. I flipped the coin where it had four persons. So guessing wildly I typed `coins with Rama and his brothers`. Bingo!! It led me to what I was looking but not exactly the same. It was an Aha moment and I was amazed to see what I was looking for. I would have definitely refused to exchange the coin for world's treasures at that moment.
So what I had with me was a coin or sometimes called temple token known as Rama Tanka. I started to like this name as well. It is Rama and Lakshmana on one side which I had mistook for Shiva and Parvathi looking at what looked like a Trishul. On the other side it is the Rama darbar. I had not at all noticed the Hanuman until I looked at the pictures. Stupid of me to have missed it.
Rama Tanka is supposed to be worshipped in Hindu households to celebrate the legend of Rama and passed on to next generations. There are genuine ancient coins and modern reproductions. Mine looks like a modern reproduction, but I am not sure. I had never seen a Rama Tanka or heard about it before. When I searched for Rama Tanka I could find a very similar coin to that of mine. I am still clueless about the exact date when this was minted and I have no idea how to figure it out also. On the whole, Searching wildly without knowing what I had with me and discovering it as Rama Tanka was a liberating experience.
Referred links:
http://www.coinquest.com/cgi-bin/cq/coins?main_coin=521&main_ct_id=54
http://psrraju1953.blogspot.com/2010/09/rama-tanka-coins-hstory.html
I have one Ram darabar coin with me, which I found my Grand fater's cash box. This coine use for worship. This was minted in 1717 by East India Co. Actualy they have no rights to Collect Tax or Mint Coin but popularty of Rama they produce this coin.
ReplyDeleteGood to know about your petty treasure Anonymous. Coins have there own charm and stories to tell. May be you could share a pic of the coin.
ReplyDeletethe first photograph is of 25 halala of saudi arabia......100 halala = 1 riyal so that coin is something like 25 paisa
ReplyDeleteAnonymous, Thanks for the details. Feels good to know it's halala!!
ReplyDelete