Pitis Al Adil

The pitis was Brunei's primary small-change currency during the sultanate's active maritime trading period, when tin-lead casting offered a practical local alternative to imported copper coinage. Sultan Muhammad Alauddin, who reigned across much of this issue's attributed window, presided over a court still conducting tributary relationships with the Qing dynasty while simultaneously managing European trading pressures from both the Dutch and the English. These pitis circulated primarily in bazaar transactions — the smallest unit of everyday commerce — and were cast rather than struck, which accounts for the considerable variation in weight and form seen across surviving specimens.