1 Karshapana - Shaishunaga dynasty

The Shaishunaga dynasty ruled Magadha during a period when coinage in the Indian subcontinent was still in its formative decades — punch-marked silver pieces like this karshapana were among the earliest standardized monetary instruments on the subcontinent. The Arthashastra of Kautilya, written somewhat later, describes the rupa-darshaka, an official assayer responsible for testing silver purity, suggesting that quality control was already an institutional concern by this period. These pieces circulated alongside trade goods moving through the Gangetic plain long before the Mauryan empire consolidated the region.