Catalog
See full images - free registration
Continue with Google - no registration!
or register with email
Why register? Just to keep bots out of our catalog. Your email stays private - we will never share it or send you anything uninvited. We guarantee you that!
Drachm Jouan-jouan imitation
| Issuer | Kushan Empire |
|---|---|
| Year | 195-230 |
| Type | Log in to see details |
| Value | Log in to see details |
| Currency | Log in to see details |
| Composition | Copper |
| Weight | Log in to see details |
| Diameter | Log in to see details |
| Thickness | Log in to see details |
| Shape | Log in to see details |
| Technique | Log in to see details |
| Orientation | Log in to see details |
| Engraver(s) | Log in to see details |
| In circulation to | Log in to see details |
| Reference(s) | Log in to see details |
| Obverse description | Log in to see details |
|---|---|
| Obverse script | Log in to see details |
| Obverse lettering | Log in to see details |
| Reverse description | The reverse displays a standing divine figure, likely a degraded representation of a deity derived from earlier Kushan iconographic tradition, occupying the central field. The effigy is rendered in a highly schematic, barbarous style with indistinct facial features and garment lines. Surrounding the central figure are scattered pellets and degenerate pseudo-legend elements, reduced to abstract strokes no longer legible as coherent script. The overall design reflects the progressive stylistic deterioration characteristic of Jouan-jouan imitative drachms struck in the late Kushan period. |
| Reverse script | Log in to see details |
| Reverse lettering | Log in to see details |
| Edge | Plain |
| Mint | Log in to see details |
| Mintage | Log in to see details |
| Additional information |
The Jouan-jouan — more properly the Rouran Khaganate — were a nomadic confederacy dominant across the eastern steppes, and their coinage conventions filtered westward through layers of imitation and re-imitation before reaching Kushan moneyers. This piece sits in that murky chain of transmission, where the original prototype had already been copied enough times that the issuing authority was imitating an imitation.
The early third century Kushan economy ran on multiple parallel denominational systems, and copper fractions of this weight class filled gaps that silver and gold couldn't practically serve at local market level.