Study of Coins with Astronomical and Constellation Themes in the Iran Money Museum

A coin is one of the most important archeological artifacts scattered in distant lands due to its economic-financial function and importance in this regard. It can be said that coins, like the pottery, are distributed throughout the empire and sometimes beyond. The economic value and significance of these works and the raw production material ensured their preservation and stability for centuries. These characteristics led to the constant use of kings, caliphs, and rulers as a medium for expressing political and religious views and propagating the empire. For this very reason, the central governments used them as a sign of their guardianship over the territory; the emperors, princes, and local rulers also consistently declared their allegiance, coinage, and various forms of coinage. From an archaeological point of view, while receiving the exact date of construction, they facilitate the chronology of archaeological layers. Because the canvas coin is so important in capturing and preserving past governments' political and cultural views, it is also of great importance in archaeological interpretation and analysis. Coins were one of the most important landmarks for portraying the faces of kings and rulers before the spread of Islam, and the inhabitants of the farthest parts of the land could see their ruling face through them. However, in the Islamic era, despite the activities of some local and regional rulers, the depiction of the ruler's face and other human and animal arrays on coins disappeared in general, despite the prohibition of portraiture.Meanwhile, copper coins called follis appeared in a different form, especially in the later centuries of the Islamic period. The line of prohibition was not observed for them, and mainly by local multiplication, they became a significant canvas for depicting animal faces and celestial bodies. Research has been done on the function of these motifs; some have attributed them to the constellations of the zodiac, while others have described them as repetitions of ancient imagery that pre-Islamicized. Some noted the religious use of these arrays.In the Iran Money Museum exhibition section, there is a dirham of Kaykhosrow Kiqbad, the merry king of Roman Seljuks in the seventh century; AH, and several follises that carry remarkable astronomical motifs and constellations. They have not been considered in independent and unique research despite preparing an export file. In the present study, an attempt was made to study these samples, introduce them and obtain their characteristics. Attempts have also been made to bring the function of the motifs to the extent to which historical sources, historical geography, and archaeological documents contribute.From the time man needed to know the time and place in the regulation of daily affairs, he noticed the apparent and esoteric movements of the planets, including the sun. He also quickly directed the light and heat of the day and year and the adjustment of the seasons to the sun. Hence, he valued it and other planets more than ever; besides tying his destiny to their actions, he was also given a divine status. He attributed much of what was happening or happening around him, including the weekly colors, the days of the week he had set, the weekly minerals, the components of the human body, and so on, to the seven constellations he knew. These objects became more and more critical in his thoughts because he was able to accurately observe their movement in the houses of the celestial sphere to determine the exact time of day, week, month, and year. So he tried to reflect the image of them or the signs of the calendar he had set on them in works of art and architecture.Communities' need for declining mid-value money to meet daily needs led to the creation of copper coins. That is why the local governors used their multiplication with the permission of the central government. Specifically, in the text of the expressions of the Safavid period follises, its local content can be seen; Because there are no more poems such as "The servant of the king of the province ...", "The coin hit the gold ..." and "Behgiti, the coin of the Qur'an ..." which was exclusively in the hands of the kings of this period. On the other hand, the annual and, at various times, non-renewable validity of these coins and their limited regional value had detrimental economic effects on the general public. The yearly renewal, despite the available results, guaranteed meager incomes for the central government and local governors. Counterfeiting in the minting of these coins had also become commonplace. These few factors led to the coinage of what had initially been an efficient solution for tax affairs based on the economy itself and gradually the economic decline of governments.At times, the base metal of coin production, especially copper, fluctuated in frequency; In such cases, copper utensils were also used in commercial exchanges and used as a means of exchange. Sometimes the dishes were cut into pieces different from the usual shape of a coin tablet. Coins were stamped in the mint, and coins were found and offered to the market. The unusual form of some Money Museum coins goes back to such exceptional circumstances. These types of currencies were popular in financial relations with letters such as "scrap," "small money," and "broken money." Insufficient supervision by the central government and the need to mint coins in large quantities had minimized the accuracy of minting. For this reason, in many specimens in which the coins of the Money Museum are mainly classified, the position of the designs and expressions do not overlap with the circular surface of the coins and sometimes did not mint.In other words, part of the vinegar is pounded out of the metal tablet during production.The frequent presence of figures in the symbolism of the Iranian and Islamic calendars with the sign of the month of the year or in astronomical rulings as the time and hour of Saad and Mubarak, and at the same time with the same image on the coins of the Money Museum, induces a similar function. This is true when we recall that in the thirteenth year of his reign, Jahangir Gurkhani ordered that in a few years, his gold coins be stamped with the symbol of the Twelve Towers, which are the twelve houses of the Sun 365 days a year, in a vivid way. Although doctrinal and religious themes can be found in some of the other coins, they are also commonly found in coins of the Money Museum and many other Islamic-era coins recorded in different public and private collections; others, although they may not show a specific month or year, mark a duplicate aspect of celestial bodies or the constellations. In other words, although many of these motifs appear to have a particular purpose in depicting the constellations of the zodiac and the periodic animals of the Chinese-Tatar calendar, they may not represent a particular year; Because multiplying a large number of them in a certain year and with various animal motifs, makes their relation to a certain year seriously questionable. Therefore, this category should be considered purely imitative and not necessarily with a calendar function.The coins of the Money Museum of Iran belong to the seventh to the end of the thirteenth century AH; One dirham belongs to Ghiasuddin Kaykhosrow Kiqbad, king of Roman Seljuk. This coin plays the role of the lion and the sun, which was the fortune of the king. Although, according to historical reports, another meaning of this role has emerged in the opinion of Shah Seljukh, one can find the horoscope of Ghias-ud-Din Kaykhosrow, which is the same tower of Assad with the presence of the sun in it. In the science of the ancient delegation, among the zodiac constellations, the lion or Assad is known as the house of the sun; That is, the sun was in the Leo, which is equivalent to August in the solar calendar. Whenever this happened naturally, it was also considered Saad clock; because at this time, the power of the sun and its warmth in Mesopotamia and the vast geography that has long carried the Iranian culture, due to the natural distance between the two seasons before after, more than ever. This idea found another face in the later centuries of the Islamic era. The new aspect goes back to the Shiite culture of the Iranian governments; the sun or sun was depicted as a symbol of the Holy Prophet of Islam (PBUH) and the lion as a symbol of the first Imam of the Shiites, Hazrat Amir al-Mo'menin Ali (AS). To express this religious idea explicitly, the phrase Yam Mohammad in the form of the sun and Yaali in the form of a lion are multiplied. Other museum coins are, in fact coins from the later centuries of the Islamic period, one belonging to the late Timurid period and several others minted in the Safavid and Qajar periods. The role of two symmetrical fish on the coin of the Timurid period is a repetition of the same pattern that has been seen in many works of art of the Islamic period; This array is considered the symbol of Pisces, which is equal to March of the glorious calendar, and a similar interpretation can be given in the examples of the Money Museum. The role of the sun, identified with the human face, can be seen in two examples. This array of repetition is the same form that existed in pre-Islamic art without a human's face. The importance of this star in providing some of the vital needs that before Islam had given it a quadruple rank is effective in its entry into works of art. In the Islamic era, he appeared in the form of the sun in works of art and architecture, and in the late Middle Ages and later centuries, he continued his artistic life with a human face. Apart from the importance of the astronomical and calendar function of this star, which has been constantly considered by human beings in compiling the first calendars, it also found another aspect in the Islamic era, namely that the sun was considered a sign of the presence of the Holy Prophet of Islam (PBUH). And they used architecture.On some others, an example of which is given in this article and belongs to the middle of the Qajar period, changes were made to the lion and sun emblem, and Zan became the official emblem of Iran; The change, which had a religious color, was that the lion's array was identified and a sword was placed in one of his hands. This sword is a symbol of Zulfiqar Imam Ali (AS). In other words, the sign that was previously represented by the phrase Ya'ali in the early Qajar period was completed with the annexation of Zulfiqar. In this way, the ancient and national emblem was combined with the Shiite religious idea and found its final form and was preserved on or on the back of Iranian coins for a long time.