Catalog
Unknown Æ - Chirdanak Kabarna, without arrow, regular portraits
| Issuer | Kabarna, City of |
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| Year | 625-701 |
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| Composition | Log in to see details |
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| Technique | Hammered |
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| Obverse description | Conjoined double portrait in profile, depicting a female bust facing left and a male bust facing right, rendered in the Sogdian artistic tradition. A crescent moon and star device appears above the portraits in the upper field. The effigies are presented in a schematic, stylized manner characteristic of early medieval Central Asian coinage. The flan is irregular and moderately struck. |
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| Mintage | ND (625-701) |
| Additional information |
Chirdanak Kabarna bronzes occupy a murky corner of early medieval Central Asian numismatics, attributed to a city-state in the Sogdian cultural sphere during the period when Sasanian political authority had collapsed and Arab conquest was still consolidating across the region. The "without arrow" designation distinguishes this type from related issues bearing a projectile symbol — a minor iconographic choice that likely carried administrative or dynastic meaning now lost to us. Sh&K (Shagalov and Kuznetsov) remains the only systematic reference for these issues, and their attribution frameworks are still debated among specialists working Sogdian coinage.