Catalog
1/2 Qirat
| Issuer | Hafsid Dynasty |
|---|---|
| Year | 1435-1574 |
| Type | Standard circulation coin |
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| Obverse description | Square hammered flan with Arabic legends arranged in multiple lines within a ruled rectangular frame. The field bears a three-line religious inscription in Kufic-influenced script declaring the sovereignty of God, the prophethood of Muhammad, and the imamate of Al-Mahdi, reflecting the Hafsid dynasty's Almohad ideological heritage. Marginal legends extend into the border areas beyond the central frame. The surfaces show characteristic irregularity of hand-struck medieval Islamic coinage, with slightly uneven relief throughout the field. |
|---|---|
| Obverse script | Arabic |
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| Additional information |
The Hafsids ruled from Tunis and at their peak commanded Mediterranean trade routes that put their coinage in contact with Aragonese merchants, Genoese bankers, and Saharan gold caravans simultaneously. This fractional silver denomination functioned at the lowest practical tier of that exchange economy, handling transactions too small for a full qirat yet substantial enough to require metal rather than barter.
The dynasty's final decades saw progressive debasement as Ottoman pressure from the east and Spanish Habsburg pressure from the north squeezed Hafsid fiscal capacity. Pieces struck closer to 1574 — when Tunis fell definitively to the Ottomans under Sinan Pasha — tend to show rougher fabric reflecting mint disruption in the terminal years.