652 New varieties of the [Oct* 



Second Series of imitations. 



We now pass to another series of coins evidently descended from 

 the same * Ardokro' type coin to which the early Canouj group has 

 heen so satisfactorily traced. In the latter case we have seen that 

 the Hindu artists soon quitted their original, and exercised a fertile in- 

 vention in varying the device during several generations of princes : 

 but in the coins we have now to notice, no claims to ingenuity can be 

 advanced ; unless it be for gradually barbarizing and disguising the 

 original type, so that it would have been absolutely impossible to 

 recognize the character of the extraordinary symbols on the later 

 pieces, had we not a numerous train of specimens to produce, in evidence 

 of the gradual deterioration. I had already more than once engraved 

 specimens of this curious series, thinking them to be merely the link 

 coins between the Rao nano rao and the early Canouj series. Among 

 the Manikyala coins was the only silver coin of the set on which 1 had 

 particularly remarked legible Sanscrit characters ; which were of a 

 form and age differing essentially from the Canouj com alphabet (so 

 called). But now through Capt. Cunningham's careful scrutiny of 

 all our available collections, I am enabled to produce a host of variable 

 legends, which may be the means of developing by and bye a second 

 royal dynasty of some other Indian locality, as successfully as has 

 been the case with the Gupta family. 



Henceforward my readers should understand, and they will, doubt- 

 less, soon perceive the fact, that my coin essays are joint productions, 

 and that I have an auxiliary at my elbow, far better acquainted with 

 the contents of, I may say, all the collections of coins in India, than 

 I have leisure to become. With his zealous aid in hunting out the 

 unpublished varieties of every class, I hope to make these notices 

 complete as far as discovery has yet proceeded, and to do fuller 

 justice to the numerous contributions I continue to receive from my 

 numismatic co-adjutors in the interior. 



That the present class is totally distinct from the last, may be 

 argued on many grounds : — those are discovered in greatest quantity 

 at Canouj, Jonpur, Gaya, and even occasionally in Bengal, — these are 

 chiefly met with in Upper India, and in tbe Panjdb. Capt. Cautley 

 has sent me one dug up in the foundations of his residence near 

 Seharanpur ; Mr. Dean dug up some at Samehana near Delhi : — but 

 the most important fact in their history is the extraction of one of 

 the lowest members of the group from the Manikyala tope by Gene- 

 ral Ventura. Mr. Masson's large collection in Afghanistan does 

 not contain one of this type, nor any of the first or Canouj series. They 

 are, therefore, purely of Indian growth. To Upper India, the Panjdb 



