The Coinage and History of Vijayanagara A Review

The Coinage and History of Vijayanagara Empire
M Girirajapathi
Bangalore, 2009

The monetary history of the Vijayanagara Empire is still rather obscure. Indian Archaeology A Review records the discovery of more than 307 coin hoards between 1954 and 2001. While certainly not an numerous both in provenance and distribution as Sultanate or Mughal coin hoards, Vijayanagara monetary history does present interesting questions of its own. One aspect that has come to the fore is the interlinking between Bahamani coinage and currency system with the Vijayanagara currency. Partly this is reflected in  majority of the coin deposits which are found mixed with sultante minted coins. Phillip Wagoner has studied this feature in a recent article published in the

Coinage and History of Vijayanagara

Indian Economic and Social History Review vol 51, 4 (2014) pp 457-480.

The book under review is a catalog of a few private numismatic collections. It makes no attempt at analysis and even the basic numismatic data is given in a rather loose manner. The provenance of the coins is not documented and the relative chronology between various coin types is not addressed. On the whole this is a very disappointing work.

The Bahamani historian Firishta has given a great deal of information about the relative value of different currencies circulating in  the region. In spite of efforts undertaken by Sultan Muhammad Shah I (1358-75) to discourage the circulation and exchange of Vijayanagara gold coins in Bahamani territories, little change was felt on the ground. The value of the Pratap and Hon need to be worked out. The reasons for the complete absence of silver coins in Vijayanagara need to be investigated. The metrology of Vijayanagara coinage needs to be determined.

This work is printed on expensive art paper but it avoids discussing any issue of importance.

Hampi Excavations; New Information

Hampi: Report on the Excavations 1011-2010
Dr C S Vasudevan
Department of Archaeology, Museum and Heritage
Government of Karnataka
Mysore

Hampi Excavation Report

The capital of the last great Empire of medieval South India, Vijayanagara, the City of Victory, has been the target of numerous efforts at interpretation, reconstruction, conservation and of course, Heritage Management. The inscription of Hampi, the site on which Vijayanagara stands as a World Heritage Site is partly responsible for the flood of interest generated by Vijaynagara. From a Chalukyan temple town located on the banks of the Tungabhadra, VIjaynagara was home to the God Virupaksha and the Goddess Pampa and therefore Pampakshetra was one of several names given to the medieval city. A fortified city, about which we have several written descriptios from the mid fifteenth century, we can expaect Vijayanagara to make a text book case for Archeological study based on written sources, corroborated or refuted by the evidence on the ground. In other others, the best strategy to approach the City of Vijayanagara from a historical-Archeological standpoint would be to ask a series of questions which are generated from the written documentation of which we have, fortunately a fairly large corpus.

The shadow of Robert Sewell has fallen heavily on this City, His Forgotten Empire was based on records. perhaps collected by the LIsbon based Historian Barros that had fortunately survived the Great Fire of 1778. Paes and Nuniz were both traders from Portugal and as Renaissance figures were keen observers of the customs and mores of Asaian peoples. However, the framework within which they asssimilated their information was as Jean Pu Rubies points out was both Christian and more specifically Portuguese. They refer to "Great Captains" who assisted the Emperor (Raya) both in war and in revenue collection. Are they the Noblemen whose Quarters form the subject of this Excavation Report.

For nearly a decade the area near the Royal Centre close to the Throne Platforms were being excavated by the Government of Karnataka and the results of that decade long excavation are published in these volumes. One question I would like to raise is: To what extent does the material and archaeological remains dug up from the Nobleman's Quarters reinforce the interpretation long current that the site was occupied by the elite. From the material catalogued in the Reports, there is little evidence of elite occupation. We do not find luxury goods and except for inferior Celadon and Porcelain ware we have no evidence of long distance trade goods or ceramics. We do not find any evidence of large scale monumental architecture in this site leading one to suspect that Sewell was perhaps carried away by the standardized description found in the Portuguese texts. Glass bangles have been found in huge numbers. Do they signify the presence of women in the area. The disturbed nature of the stones makes any systematic study of the site difficult.

The two volumes have catalogued all the artifacts found dring the course of the excavations. But sadly they lack historical and stategraphic specificity.