Dirham - Nasir al-Din Artuq Arslan

Nasir al-Din Artuq Arslan ruled Mardin for nearly half a century — an unusually long reign for an Anatolian lord sandwiched between the Ayyubids and the Seljuqs of Rum. His silver dirhams were struck during a period when the Artuqid branch at Mardin was simultaneously paying tribute to more powerful neighbors while maintaining enough independent authority to issue coinage in their own name. The dynasty is far better known for its copper figural coins, which drew on Hellenistic and Byzantine iconographic sources; the silver output is considerably rarer and receives less scholarly attention.