Samarqand in the late seventh century was a city under acute pressure — Arab armies had been raiding Sogdiana repeatedly since the 650s, and the local Ikhshid rulers minted coins that deliberately retained pre-Islamic iconographic and monetary conventions as a form of cultural resistance. The absence of the central hole on this type is a notable departure from the dominant cast-coin tradition of the Sogdian sphere, where square-holed issues dominated everyday exchange. Whether this reflects a specific administrative decision or workshop variation remains debated among specialists in Sogdian numismatics.
Samarqand in the late seventh century was a city under acute pressure — Arab armies had been raiding Sogdiana repeatedly since the 650s, and the local Ikhshid rulers minted coins that deliberately retained pre-Islamic iconographic and monetary conventions as a form of cultural resistance. The absence of the central hole on this type is a notable departure from the dominant cast-coin tradition of the Sogdian sphere, where square-holed issues dominated everyday exchange. Whether this reflects a specific administrative decision or workshop variation remains debated among specialists in Sogdian numismatics.