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Astronomical Symbols on Indian Punchmarked Coins?
Chapter · January 2019
DOI: 10.1007/978-981-13-3645-4_28
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Mayank Nalinkant Vahia
Tata Institute of Fundamental Research
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Vahia, M.N., Orchiston, W., and Sule, A. (eds.), 2017. Growth and Development of Astronomy and Astrophysics in India and
the Asia-Pacific Region. Proceedings of the 9th International Conference on Oriental Astronomy. Mumbai, Tata Institute of
Fundamental Research. Pp. xx‒xx.
ASTRONOMICAL SYMBOLS ON INDIAN
PUNCH-MARKED COINS?
Terry Hardaker
Honorary Research Associate, Heberden Coin Room, Ashmolean Museum,
Oxford area code?, United Kingdom.
Email: xxxxx
and
Mayank Vahia and Nisha Yadav
Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, Homi Bhabha Road,
Mumbai 400 005, India.
Emails: mnvahia@gmail.com; list Yadav
Abstract: We suggest that the signs on ancient punch-marked coins of India may have been derived from
astronomical observations.
1 INTRODUCTION
and yet enlightening patterns (joining points in
different ways). The movement of the Sun and
Moon (with its phases), passing comets, and
their association with ‘father sky’ in early religions
would have captivated the imagination. It is
therefore natural that when searching for simple
symbols to put on coins, the sky would provide
an important source of design, apart from animals
and plants.
Coins have been minted since the early historic
period in India, from around 430 BCE. The
earliest of them are termed ‘punch-marked coins’,
and were made of silver. They are marked with
multiple symbols, the meaning of which is difficult
to interpret, but may have included identification
of the kingdom, to authenticate their use and to
ensure that they were not forged. A typical coin
would have between two and five symbols (Gupta and Hardaker, 2014). The issuing authority
needed to select various patterns or symbols to
incorporate them on the coins. Some of these
symbols recur frequently throughout the duration
of punch-marked coinage, while others appear
only once. Here we discuss some of the symbols
found on these coins.
The human relationship with the sky can be
dated back at least 15,000 years, the date of the
first rock art depicting astronomy in the Lascaux
Caves in France (see Rappenglück, 2004). Since
then, human fascination has grown significantly
with complex dotted patterns that can be found in
Indian rock art (reference?) as well as on punchmarked coins (Figure 1). It is becoming increasingly clear that the small marks commonly seen
as adjuncts to the main motifs on rock art as
The night sky has made a deep impression
on the human mind. The stars provide simple
Figure 1: Rock art from Jihri caves (left), and early punch-marked coins (after list reference(s)).
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T. Hardakar, M.N. Vahia and Nisha Yadav
Astronomical Symbols in Punch-mark Coins
Figure 2: Some of the symbols seen on punch-marked coins catalogued by Gupta and Hardaker (2014), using their symbol numbers.
well as on Celtic coins are not just random
doodles, but have a coded meaning which often
relates to the sky. We therefore propose that
signs on coins could be of astronomical symbolism. It is evident that this custom appeared at
an early stage in the punch-marked coinage when
symbols were mainly geometric, and the coins
were being issued by small Janapada states in
the Gangetic region (reference?). We will show
that in early Indian coins, one can see several
examples of direct representation of stars in the
sky. Such a possibility in a European context
has been discussed by Marshall (2008).
dated to around the middle of the last millennium BC, are small silver discs or rectangles
on which symbols have been impressed using a
punch and a hammer. A large number of coins
of this period have been published in varying
degrees of detail, but we restrict our study to the
Magadha/Mauryan series as catalogued by Gupta
and Hardaker (ibid.) as representative of a large
segment of punch-marked coinage. It should be
noted that the coins are typically small, 1–3 cm in
size, and the punch marks tend to be no more than
6–9 mm in size, seriously restricting the freedom
of expression that an artist could exercise. Whereas rock art offered a broad canvas upon which to
place astronomical symbols amongst other motifs, the punch mark presented only a small isolated space to display the subject.
2 COINS IN INDIA
In India the oldest coins are punch-marked coins
belonging to early Janapadas and Mahajanapadas (Gupta and Hardaker, 2014). These coins,
3 ASTRONOMICAL SYMBOLISM ON
THE COINS
In Figure 2 we present some of the symbols in
the coin shown in Gupta and Hardaker’s 2014
catalogue.
In the first row of Figure 2 an animal with
some dots or other objects above the animal is
seen. The details of these vary. The natural place
to put symbols that refer to the sky would be
above the main subject, i.e. in the ‘sky’. Other
examples are seen in symbols 132 and 537.
Some of these may represent constellations or
asterism, such as the Pleiades, which is a very
conspicuous conspicuous group of seven closely
packed stars. In Figure 3 we reproduce the
Stellarium© image of the Pleiades in the neighbourhood of the Moon taken on 25 December
502 BCE at 5:40 am. Note that such events
lasting a few tens of minutes would recur once
every 18.5 years. Symbol 112 shows a crescent
Moon with a small dog-like animal inside and five
dots above the crescent Moon. We suggest that
Figure 3: The constellation of Pleiades. This image is taken
from Stellarium© for 25 December 502 BCE at 5.40 am
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T. Hardakar, M.N. Vahia and Nisha Yadav
Astronomical Symbols in Punch-mark Coins
this symbol is an image of the Moon in the
Pleiades. This is discussed below. In the second
row in Figure 2 we have symbol 26, with images
of an elephant on a tortoise (previously identified
as an elephant on a spider). There is a common
mythological belief in India that the Earth stands
on a tortoise (and similar folklore is found in Europe). Symbols 467 and 468 show a circle with
rays emanating from it. This has been a conventional way of depicting the Sun, and symbol
537 clearly shows the radiating circle above the
back of a bullock.
id. The constellation has more than 60 stars,
and hence the number of stats seen in the region
will vary depending on the observer and the sky
conditions.
4 POSSIBLE DEPICTIONS OF THE PLEIADES
ON COINS
Figure 4: Possible representations of the Moon and the
Pleiades in conjunction on punch-marked coins Series 0 and
I are the issues of Magadha janapada dating to the mid-late
fifth century BCE (after list reference).
Myths about the Pleiades, also known as the
‘Seven Sisters’, are found in many cultures (eg.,
see Rappenglück, 2008). The Pleiades comprise
seven closely placed stars that have held the
attention of people for millennia, and because
they are located just above the ecliptic they come
in conjunction with the Moon every 18.5 years.
At this time, the phase of the Moon will depend
on the exact Sun – Moon angle. It may thus
have attracted special attention as a powerful
force in the Janapada period. Some of the Sun,
Moon or star arrangements found on early
Magadhan coinage are shown in Figure 4. Note
that while the Pleiades is referred to as the ‘Seven
Sisters’, in the past the positions and numbers of
visible stars varied due to the proper motions of
the stars.
5 REFERENCES
Gupta, P.L., and Hardaker, T.R., 2014. Punchmarked Coinage of the Indian Subcontinent:
Magadha-Mauryan Series. Mumbai, IIRNS Publications.
Marshall, F., 2008. Astronomical Symbols on
Ancient and Medieval Coins. Jefferson, McFarland and Company.
Rappenglück, M.A., 2004. A Palaeolithic planetarium
underground. - The cave of Lascaux (Part 1). Migration and Diffusion. An International Journal, 5, 93–
119.
Rappenglück, M., 2008. The Pleiades and Hyades as
celestial spatiotemporal indicators in the astronomy
of archaic and indigenous cultures. In Wolfschmidt,
G. (ed.). Prahistorische Astronomie under Ethnoastronomie. Hamburg, Books on Demand. Pp. 12–
29.
In Indian mythology, the Pleiades are the six
wives of the sages who form the constellation
Ursa Major.
Hence a representation of the
Pleiades by six or seven stars would be equally va-
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