Dirham 'Ornamental type' - anepigraphic Bulghar mint

The anepigraphic Bulghar dirhams pose a genuine attribution puzzle that occupied scholars for decades. Lacking the mint and ruler inscriptions standard to Golden Horde silver, they were long misclassified or simply set aside in reference collections. Signed catalog consensus now places them at Bulghar — the Volga Bulgarian city that remained a functioning mint center well into the Mongol period — but the deliberate omission of epigraphy has never been satisfactorily explained. A ceremonial or token function has been proposed, though circulation wear on most known examples argues against that.