What coins would have circulated in medieval Arabia?

spoon

That is, during the life of Mohammed (apx 570-632 AD) and on the western coast (Mecca-Medina, etc)?

I'm not very literate on the economic history of the time or region, so I ask you guys hoping we'll have a specialist (as always ). Sassanian (Khusru II) and Byzantine (Heraclius) coins are all that I know of in the neighboring area, but would they have travelled to western Arabia? Are there any other large-scale moneyers from that time and place?

I think I'll leave the questions there for now.. I really am ignorant of this!

BigAlan

Coins of the Roman Empire went as far as China and India. Most of the coins circulating at that time would do so as bullion rather than face value. Due to certain debasement practices the older Roman coins had more value.

If you are interested in that sort of thing, Howgego's Ancient History from Coins is a somewhat technical book on the how and why of coinage and its circulation.

newsman

I would guess that Byzantine and Sassanid coins would predominate. Arabia was technically part of both empires at various periods, although neither exercised effective control. Being at the fringes of both empires, Arabia also was somewhat of the middleman in East-West trade, so I would suspect there would be a lot of different coins in circulation. Also, the Arabs even to this day have a preference for hard money (gold and silver) and don't worry much about where it's from -- in more modern times, the currency of choice was the Maria Theresa thaler.

coachleonard

I would also guess Sassian and Byzantine-- in fact, the first Islamic coins were copies of Byzantine-styled coins (arab-byzantine bronzes made in the late 600's.)

earlwbollinger

Roman, Roman Provincial, Byzantine, Sassanian, Egyptian, and some Greek like copies too.
Plus since people were used to coins like the Roman or Greek , they made their own copies of them
too.

spoon

Ah, interesting. Thanks for all the leads guys!

I think I'm going to have to pick up a Sassanid coin.. they're pretty cool on their own I dunno, maybe I'll switch to this area of collecting altogether.. they seem fairly affordable.