Elemental Analysis of Silver Coins of Naser al-Din Shah's Qajar Issued Yazd by the PIXE Method

During the reign of Naser al-Din Shah Qajar (1264-1313 AH) there were many silver Qirans between the years 1264-1294 AH. He was beaten in Yazd Mint. Although the Naserite coinage system was nominally a follower of the Tehran system, in practice each city had an autonomous military system, and the coins of most cities were struck with different amounts of silver purity. In addition to measuring the purity of silver and its changes in the coins minted in Yazd, this article explains the economic power of Yazd and compares it with the main cities of Qajar Iran, namely Mashhad, Tabriz, Isfahan, and Shiraz. Therefore, the elemental analysis of coins of this period was the main basis of this study using pixie method and 22 coins in 11 different dates were analyzed as a result of the trend of changes in silver purity on average throughout this period. Multiplication of 90.09%, explained and its high position in terms of silver purity compared to the mints of Mashhad (84%), Tabriz (82%), Tehran (90%), Isfahan (84%), and Shiraz (90%) ), Determined. Finally, valuable information was obtained on the type of silver mines used, namely the Cerussite mines and how the coins were minted with copper and iron metals.