Abstract
The Mughal Empire established a single trimetallic currency with the silver rupee as its basic coin. Yet, strangely, its most commercialised penance Gujarat continued to use alongside the imperial rupee a local silver coin called ma°mødð. The paper examines how this came about and how Gujarat in effect got divided into two zones, in one of which the rupee was the main circulating medium, in the other, the ma°mødð.
By the beginning of the seventeenth century, the Mughal currency system had established itself over a large part of the country through imperial expansion and a series of administrative measures ranging from monetised taxation and serial mint production to standardisation of the circulating medium. 1 Mughal India thus had a single currency system transcending regions with its principal silver coin, the rupee, as the legal tender. The Mughal government prohibited the circulation of any coin other than the one uttered by the imperial mints and the standard policy was to convert all non-Mughal coins, Indian and foreign, into coins of the current monarch. The Mughal emperors treated coinage as a symbol of sovereignty and its issuance and integrity a matter of great prestige. 2 Minting was also a commercial activity since coins were struck in large numbers on payment of a fee (seigniorage) at every mint. Generally speaking, the market too preferred a single currency system to avoid the tedium of multiple exchanges in long-distance trade, which added to transaction costs.
The standard Mughal method to deal with regional currencies was, therefore, to demonetise them as far as possible. The most effective method for achieving this objective was to refuse to accept revenue payment in coins of the demonetised currencies or accept them only at a discount and use their metal in minting imperial coinage. By such measures, the demonetised currency could, after a period of time, be driven out of circulation. There were, however, three major challenges to the process. First, the state had to ensure liquidity in those exchange networks from where the currency was culled out. Second, local chiefs could have had a financial interest in keeping in circulation the currencies they issued from their mints. Third, some local currencies commanded strong customary loyalty among the money-changers (s[arråfs) and the money users alike.
The Gujarat Ma°mūdī
The silver coinage of the Gujarat Sultans (1410–1572) was modelled on the tanka of the Delhi Sultanate (169.8 grains) although the Gujarat tanka was slightly heavier (177.6 grains). In the second half of the fifteenth century, Ma°mød Shåh (1458–1511) replaced the tanka with a lighter silver coin of 88 grains called ma°mødð. Ma°mød’s successor, Muz]affar Shåh II (1511–25), issued a heavier silver coin of 111 grains, called muz]affarð, which was minted till 1560. The last ruler of the Gujarat Sultanate, Muz]affar Shåh III (1560–73) issued two silver coins of new weights. The lighter variety was of 72 grains, lighter than the ma°mødð, and the heavier variety was 118 grains, heavier than the muz]affarð. Of the five denominations of silver coins of the Gujarat Sultanate issued in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, it was the ma°mødð that survived the demise of the regime and circulated in large quantities in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. 3
The ma°mødð posed a challenge to the Mughal monetary expansion and unification for the reason, among those mentioned earlier, that it was not located in one place and had multiple sources of origin. In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, the ma°mødð was made up of not one but three currencies, all lying outside the imperial system. These currencies were controlled by local chieftains subordinated intermittently to the authority of the Mughal emperor. In western (peninsular) Gujarat, the chieftains of Bhuj and Navanagar together coined a ma°mødð. In southern Gujarat, notably Surat, yet another ma°mødð circulated that was minted by the chieftains of Baglana. The third variety of ma°mødð appears to be in the same league as the ma°mødð of the chiefdoms. In Baroda and Broach, a ma°mødð circulated with the epithet changezð well after the end of the Gujarat Sultanates.
The ports of Gujarat received large quantities of imported gold, silver and copper and much of this was minted into coins. From the middle of the sixteenth century, after the discovery and exploitation of silver mines in Spanish America, the quantity of silver coming to Gujarat from Europe through the Levant and around the Cape of Good Hope increased immensely, and generated an expansion of the minting and circulation of silver coins in the region. Merchants coming to Gujarat from other parts of the country would conduct their business in the local coins and raise or remit cash through bills of exchange drawn in the local currency. All prices, wages and interest rates now tended to be quoted in the ma°mødð, the main silver coin. Once established as the bill-currency and main exchange medium in commerce, merchants in Gujarat ports found it convenient to continue with ma°mødðs so long as these were available, and not shift to rupees. This created a market for ma°mødðs, which though no longer coined by imperial mints, began to be minted by local chieftains, who could earn profit and also win prestige by such mintage. (See Map 1 for the zones where ma°mødð remained current till late Mughal times.)
The Ma°mūdī of Kachchh-Kathiawar
The chiefdoms of Kachchh and Saurashtra (Sorath) or Kathiawar (Kachchh-i khwurd) were two autonomous territories of rulers originating from common descent. In the Gujarat Sultanate, the chief of Kachchh had 2,080 villages and commanded 4,000 troopers. In the seventeenth century, his domain expanded to include 8,000 villages and ports. 4 In the sixteenth century, a chiefdom was established in Kathiawar by a breakaway scion of the dynasty, centred at Navanangar. The two chiefdoms had tributary relationships with the Gujarat Sultanate and later with the Mughal Empire which involved payment mainly of tribute and supply of horses and assistance of various kinds.
The chiefdoms collectively issued a silver coin that acquired a popular designation and currency. The coin was issued in the name of the chieftain of Bhuj but from the mint (dåru’z[z[arb) located in Navanagar. The two chieftaincies appear to have had an arrangement in which the coin was minted by one in the name of the other as superior ruler. This can be surmised from the fact that although we have a description in our sources of the name, weight, exchange rate, legend and location of the coin minted at Navanagar, not a single specimen of coins in the names of the Jams of Navanagar—from Satrasal to Lakhaji—has been found. Instead all the coins which accord with the description given in the sources are in the name of the chief of Bhuj. Also, no Mughal source ever refers either to the minting of coins by the Bhuj chief or the reaction of the Mughal state to it. Such textual references as have come down to us are given only for the Navanagar chief.
The Bhuj-Navanagar coin was modelled on the lighter silver issue of Muz]affar III and had the same weight, 74 grains (4.5 måsha). It had the name of either the Gujarat Sultan Muz]affar Shåh or the Mughal Emperor Akbar (1556–1605). Alongside the name of the reigning chief of Bhuj, also title Jåm, was inscribed in the Devanagari script (Hindi). This coin is usually designated ma°mødð in our sources but sometimes also jåmð.
5
The Bhuj-Navanagar ma°mødð carried a frozen date of 978
Maḥmūdīs of Kachchh (Bhuj)
Mughal Rupee versus Ma°mūdī: Northern Gujarat
The Mughal effort to compete with the peninsular ma°mudð was launched in Ahmadabad which became the capital of the Mughal s[øba of Gujarat after its conquest in 1572. A mint was established at Ahmadabad to strike fresh Mughal coins as well as convert the ma°mudðs into rupees. Some of the freshly minted rupees did not stay in Gujarat and went inland to pay for the purchases made there. The recovery of numerous hoards comprising Ahmadabad rupees across the central regions of the empire points to the direction of the physical movement of the coins. An unknown quantity, however, circulated in northern Gujarat in competition with the ma°mødð. As a result, by the end of the sixteenth century, in Ahmadabad and Cambay the rupee had carved out its own area of circulation. In European accounts of the trade of Cambay, the sikka rupee was stated to be the coin acceptable in payment. 8 From 1599 onwards, bills of exchange (hundi) drawn upon Cambay and Ahmadabad were encashed in rupees, and the bills drawn at Ahmadabad on other cities were discounted in the same currency. 9 The ma°mudð, however, did not disappear from Ahmadabad, at least not in accounting. According to the author of a history of Gujarat, till his own time (1761), all transactions there relating to the sale and purchase of ghee (raughan i zard) were expressed in ma°mudð. 10
Assault and Resistance: Kathiawar
During the reigns of Akbar and Jahångðr, the Jåm of Navanagar remained in control of his territory on payment of tribute. 11 In 1641, during the reign of the Mughal Emperor Shåhjahån, a military campaign was launched by the Governor of Gujarat, A‘z]am Khån, to seek ‘obedience’ from the Jåm. Following a Mughal protocol, a message was sent in advance with two specific demands, namely payment of tribute (peshkash) and dissolution of the ma°mūdð mint at Navanagar. The Jam accepted the terms and paid the peshkash in 100 Kachchh horses and 3 lakh ma°mūdðs. The Jåm also agreed to stop the minting of the ma°mūdð. 12 To ensure demonetisation of the Navanagar ma°mødð and its replacement by the Mughal rupee, a mint was established by Shahjahan at Junagadh. 13 While the Junagadh mint issued the rupee for some years during the reign of Shahjahan, and his successor Aurangzeb, it did not quite serve the purpose of reminting the ma°mudð. This was partly because the Junagadh mint received supplies of fresh silver brought by merchants from Diu and other ports of peninsular Gujarat. The suppliers, instead of going to the Ahmadabad mint, found it more convenient to get their bullion minted into rupees at Junagadh. 14
The continued minting of the ma°mødð from Navanagar can be surmised from subsequent political events. In 1663, a succession crisis in the chiefdom prompted military intervention by the Mughal faujdår of Junagadh, Qut]bu’ddðn Khån, to collect the tribute. The mint at Navanagar was targeted and demolished. 15 Subsequently, the mint was reinstated, but to turn ma°mødð into rupees; and the revenue of the mint was integrated into the fisc. 16 All this might have had only a temporary effect, since the Navanagar mint continued to coin ma°mødð together in the name of Muz]affar Shåh and the Jåm, well into the eighteenth century. 17
Rupees and Ma°mūdīs as Competing Currencies: Southern Gujarat
In southern Gujarat, especially in the port city of Surat which rose to eminence in the early seventeenth century, the ma°mødð was the sole medium of exchange as well as money of account. 18 The Mughal drive to impose a uniform currency system, successful in north Gujarat, faced a much bigger challenge in the south. The ma°mødð was used by merchants, bankers (s[arråfs), shopkeepers and transporters for commercial transactions and by Mughal officials for accepting and disbursing cash. 19 A separation of Surat and Ahmadabad into distinct ma°mødð and rupee areas thus came into existence:
Moneys current in Surrat is of silver, called a mamudo, being of value almost 12 d. sterling. Another coin there is of copper, called a pize, whereof you have commonly 34 in the mamudo, being so great as they are worth it, therefore as copper riseth or falleth you have more or less in the mamudos… Other coins pass in Cambaya and Amadavad called rupies. 20
There seen to have been two principal reasons for the continued circulation of ma°mødðs in Surat and other parts of southern Gujarat until 1610. First, there were not perhaps enough rupees to meet the transaction demands of a commercialising region to the extent of pushing the ma°mødð out of circulation.
Second, while rupee circulation was restricted to the areas covered by the Ahmadabad mint in the north, the supply of ma°mødðs in the south came from the autonomous principality of Baglana, situated in the Sahyadri range between Gujarat and the Deccan. The Baglana ma°mødð, the second variety in our list, was struck in the twin fortress towns of Salher and Mulher (north-west corner of the present Nasik district). The chiefs of Baglana, the Bharjis, retained control of their territory and the trade routes by acknowledging the authority of the rulers of Khandesh, Gujarat or the Mughals as the situation demanded.
21
A contemporary description of the territory and its relationship with the Mughal state comes from one of the early European travellers passing through this part of India in January 1610:
This towne [Bhadwad] is the last of note in Pectopshaws [Pratap Shah’s] land, who is a small king or Rajaw, a Gentile, keeping on the top of inaccessible mountaines, which begin at Curka and extend many courses. He holdeth two faire cities, Salere, and the other Muliere, where the mamudees are coined… The Acabar besieged him seven yeares, and in the end was forced to compound with him, giving him Narampore, Dayta, and Badur, with diverse other aldeas, for the safe conduct of his merchants alongst this plaine.
22
Much as in the case of the Jams of Bhuj and Navanagar, the Mughal government allowed Pratap Shah to retain his core possessions on certain conditions. The chief of Baglana also appears to have obtained the concession from Akbar to mint ma°mødðs in the name of the Mughal emperor although this fact is not mentioned in any of the Mughal sources. 23 As we saw, the practice of minting coins in the name of a suzerain was prevalent in peninsular Gujarat.
There is a series of silver coins in museum and private collections which closely resemble the ma°mødð of Sultan Ma°mūd Begadha in weight (88 grains) and workmanship (Table 2). However, the legends inscribed on the coins follow the early Mughal tradition: the kalima on the obverse and Akbar’s name and title on the reverse. The date on the coin is the actual one up to a point but the name of Akbar is frozen. The last datable coin of this series is the issue of 1027
Baglana Maḥmūdī Issued in Akbar’s Name: Museum and Private Collections
Mughal Rupee versus Baglana Ma°mūdī: The Role of the Surat Mint
A turning point came in the circulation of the Baglana ma°mødð with the Surat mint producing rupees on a regular basis from 1620. The port of Surat was receiving large quantities of silver from the Red Sea, Persian Gulf and Europe.
28
Much of the fresh silver was taken to the new mint either directly or through the efforts of the local administration.
29
The Surat mint quickly overshadowed the one at Ahmadabad and from now on became the major recipient of imported bullion and the largest producer of rupee coins in the Mughal empire.
30
However, much of its output was carried northwards as the large share of Surat-minted rupees in Mughal-period coin-hoards found in Uttar Pradesh show.
31
Despite this outflow, the abundance of rupees minted at Surat may be expected to have replaced use of Baglana ma°mūdðs in actual transactions. In the report of the Dutch Factor, Francisco Pelsaert (c. 1626 Formerly mahmudis, and not rupees, were current here [at Surat]; the ma°mūdð is smaller, and worth only 10 stivers by our reckoning. Rupees have come into circulation during the last five or six years; the ma°mūdð is still the nominal unit for sales and purchases, but the actual payment is generally made in rupees, which we take as 24 stivers. The king has now a mint in Surat, as in Ahmadabad and all other capital cities.
32
Money-changing, Discount and the Baglana Ma°mūdī
In any multi-metallic currency system, many currencies remain in circulation, but there is always one currency that becomes the standard. 33 In Surat, it was the ma°mødð in which prices, wages and debts were stated. 34 The increased circulation of the rupee in Surat created the complexity of dual exchange. The norm in the Mughal markets was to make payment in the same coin in which the value was expressed or contract stipulated. If a transaction involved two separate currencies, there was always a charge in payment known as batta (allowance or discount). The charge represented the cost of changing money done by professional money-changers (s[arråf) and it was borne by the recipient. The charge included the cost of procuring the money and the commission of the s[arråf. For instance, in 1633, the English factors at Surat sold a consignment of gold to the local merchant Virji Vora who gave them the option of receiving payment in both ma°mødð and rupee. There was, however, a charge of 13 ma°mødðs per 100 rupees on payment made in the latter. 35 The charge on rupee payment in Surat varied with the supply and demand of the two currencies just as the commission of the money-changer on currency exchange. 36 The prevalence of the discount on rupee–ma°mūdð exchange was attributed to the fact that it was ‘none of the kings coyne, butt coyned by the Rajah of Mallore, a place distant from whence 70 course or myles’. 37 If the pull of demand of the ma°mūdð was the same as that of the rupee, then the cost of procuring it would have added to exchange value of the coin. It was not available locally and had to be sourced from Baglana, about 200 kilometres south-east of Surat. Money-changers and bullion merchants (sometimes one and the same) had to take coined and uncoined silver to the mint of Mulher which involved transport cost, minting charges and risks. In 1619, the English factors at Surat honoured a bill of exchange (hundi) drawn upon them by the Agra factors for money taken up there. The hundi was paid for in rials of eight (silver dollars minted in Mexico and Spain) to a s[arråf who sent the rials to Mulher for minting. The consignment was robbed and the money was lost. The robbers captured and punished included those who had been entrusted with the task of carrying the money. 38
The reason for the discount was because the rupee was a local as well as an imperial coin and, unlike the ma°mødð, circulated in a much larger area. The rupee was current in markets with which Gujarat had commercial links and the rupee circulating in Surat was used for making payments in a much larger area than the ma°mødð. The demand and supply of the two currencies were shaped, inter alia, by these two considerations. The annexation of Baglana to the Mughal empire as a separate wilåyat following a military expedition in 1638 and the occupation of its forts, including Salher and Mulher, must have had an impact on the supply of the ma°mødð to Surat and adjacent regions where it circulated. 39
It seems, however, that it had no immediate effect on the availability of ma°mødðs at Surat, as we shall presently see. The relative circulation of the two coins was critical to the long-distance trade which linked Gujarat to the markets of central and northern India. In one important case, the grain merchants (banjåras) brought supplies of grain to Gujarat, and received payment in ma°mødðs. The banjaras required rupees to buy grains from the countryside or grain markets (mandis) and were willing to exchange the ma°mødðs even at a low rate. The exchange rate of the rupee was thus raised. Since the exchange rate between rupee and ma°mødð was customarily fixed, the rise was reflected in higher discounts. The discount reached its peak during the great famine of Gujarat (1630–32). The incident of gold transaction mentioned above records a high discount rate prevalent in the aftermath of the famine. The premium on the rupee also grew with the needs of the Gujarati merchants themselves to send money for seasonal investments outside the ma°mødð areas. 40 The rates returned to normal when fresh supplies of rupees from mints and other sources brought about a relative fall in its demand. 41
The prevalence of the system of discount suggested that the change in the use of rupee for accounting was slow and that the ma°mødð was indeed a parallel currency. 42 As a result the sarrafs were not willing to expose the exchange rate of the two currencies to market fluctuations. In the early seventeenth century, the exchange rate was fixed at 2.5 ma°mødðs per rupee. In the 1630s, it was 2.25 ma°mødðs per rupee, and in the second half of the seventeenth century it was again 2.5 ma°mødðs. The exchange rate was therefore fixed for longer duration and the supply and demand conditions of the currencies were handled through the instrument of discount.
A much cited Dutch commercial report by van Twist, prepared just before the Mughal annexation of Baglana (1638) and reproduced here with accurate translation, summaries the status of the rupee and the ma°mūdð in Surat and the rest of Gujarat.
Money of this country is twofold, mahmudis and rupees. Mahmudis are struck in Surat of alloyed silver, worth about 102/3 stivers by our reckoning. These are current only in Broach, Cambay, Baroda and the said Surat. In Ahmadabad and the whole of Gujarat, Shahjahani rupees (‘ropias-chaganni’) are current, of good alloy and worth 24 Dutch stivers. 43
Van Twist (c. 1638), errs here, of course, in considering the ma°mødð to be of Surat mintage. The annexation of the territory of Baglana in 1638 does not seem to have had any immediate effect on the availability of ma°mødðs at Surat. This is shown by an order (nishån) issued by Princess Jahånårå, who then held Surat in her jågðr. This order took account of the fact that although the salaries of the officials of her establishment of Surat were fixed in rupees, they had actually to be paid in ma°mødðs. The conversion rate adopted in her establishment was two ma°mødðs to the rupee, when the actual rate was 2¾ ma°mødðs to the rupee. The Princess ordered that the latter rate was to be followed, and should the rate for ma°mødð fall further, this was also to be taken into account. 44 Clearly, there was no shortage of ma°mødð coins in Surat in 1643, since it must have been their plenitude that was pressing down their value. Whether the ma°mødð was now minted at Mulher under Mughal aegis is not clear. Thevenot, the French traveller, visiting Surat in 1666 called the ma°mødð a ‘Mogole silver coin’. 45 He ought to have known.