The Hindu : Kerala News : Row over world's smallest coin takes a new turn

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Aug 25, 2004

Kerala

Kerala

Row over world's smallest coin takes a new turn

By M. Harish Govind

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM, AUG. 24. An ongoing row between the Archaeology Department and a section of numismatists over the world's `smallest' coin, has taken a new turn with the department questioning the status of the silver Quarter Tara of Vijayanagar as a legal tender coin in the true sense of the term.

The department has claimed that the Half Vellichakram of Travancore, which weighs 0.18 gm and has a diameter of 5 mm, could be the smallest coin in the world, whereas numismatists maintain that the unique honour should go to the Quarter Tara, which weighs just 0.06 gm and has a diameter of 4 mm.

Lacks evidence

According to the Archaeology Director, V. Manmadhan Nair, there is no evidence to prove that the Quarter Tara was part of the official currency of Vijayanagar. Besides, there is no evidence for its metrology (weight and size), source, find-spot, mint mark, date, authority and symbology, all of which are prerequisites for acceptance of a coin as a legal tender piece.

Mr. Manmadhan Nair says the metal of the Quarter Tara is highly brittle and the coins available at present cannot be measured flawlessly as they are highly damaged. Even in the archaeological excavations conducted in Hampi, no antiquities connected with minting operations had been unearthed. The "well-accepted" official currency of Vijayanagar is the Gold Varahan series, he adds.

According to the director, the Tara coins of Kozhikode also could not be considered to be a legal tender coin for the same reasons, even though it could be the smallest currency in the Malabar area. In contrast, the Half Vellichakram satisfied all the prerequisites for a legal tender coin. Its source and find-spot were unchallengeable, as the department had collected a large hoard of coins and mint materials from the Huzur treasury of Travancore.

Claim disputed

Numismatists, however, dispute the department's claim and point out that there is ample literary and epigraphic evidence to show that the Tara formed part of the Vijayanar currency. "The department is trying to apply the criteria for a modern machine-struck coin to a hand-struck medieval coin and the fault is with the prerequisites, not the coin," says Beena Sarasan, executive member of the South Indian Numismatic Society.

The silver Tara coin system finds mention in the travelogues of the Persian emissary, Abdul Razzak, who visited Hampi in 1443, and other emissaries, she points out. An agreement of the East India Company with a Malabar chieftain, in 1737, reproduced in Logan's "Malabar Manual", also refers to the payment to soldiers of "four measures of rice and one Tar per diem".

It is pointed out that though the Half Vellichakram was a legal tender coin, it also does not satisfy all the prerequisites laid down by the department for the acceptance of a coin as legal tender. There is, for instance, no name of the issuing authority or that of the State on the coin, whereas the half and quarter rupees of Travancore have it.

Another city-based numismatist, N. Sreedhar, points out that coins of a weight of 0.035 mg to 0.042 mg, which were in circulation in Nepal in the 17th and 18th centuries, had been catalogued recently. "The Department should make a proper study before hurrying to conclude that the Half Vellichakram is the world's smallest coin," he remarks.

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