1881.] 
79 
C. J. Rodgers— On the Coins of the Sikhs. 
the retainers had one common ground for discontent, one common bond of 
union, their faith. They were Sikhs. Their oppressors were Muhammadans. 
Each of these leadings was called a Misl. The whole of the Misls was 
termed “ the Sarba Khalsa or whole Sikh people.” Here were then mate¬ 
rials for the formation of a mighty republic in the East. But there was 
only one Washington on earth in those days and he was in America. The 
spirit which animated him and his fellow countrymen was one of liberty 
and law and desire for the common weal. In the Panjab there was no 
such man and no such spirit. The Panjab had passed through no prelimi¬ 
nary training and was not fitted for liberty. Each man, as he had risen by 
oppression, maintained himself by the same means. His chief thoughts 
were for self-aggrandizement. Hence these twelve Misls of the Sikhs 
became twelve centres of jealousy. So long as Ahmad Shah kept on 
invading India, they remained to a certain extent united against a common 
foe. After he left India, after his 7th expedition in 1764, the Sikhs for a 
while combined. They were to have had a “ Gurumata” or assembly of 
the chiefs (a congress or parliament) once a year, but it never came to any¬ 
thing, or its meetings were attended only by the religious. One thing is 
certain, they got possession of Lahore and Amritsar. And at this time they 
struck, in Lahore the political capital of the Panjab, the first Sikh rupees. 
They were called “ Gohindshdhif not “ Nanak Shdhi ” as Mr. Griffin 
states. The latter term came into use afterwards as we shall see. The 
inscriptions were the following :— 
Obverse— 
Reverse— 
^ f ^ i— j j"-*-® 
I Arp 
See plate Y, fig. 1. It is a rupee of good, almost pure, silver, weigh¬ 
ing 177 grs. which is the average weight of the rupees of the Moghuls. 
The distich on the obverse is intended for Persian poetry. It means 
“ Abundance (the word is deg = cooking-pot ; we have the same vulga¬ 
rism in England—‘ to keep the pot boiling’ means to have food sufficient 
for daily use) the sword, victory and help without delay, Guru Gobind 
Singh obtained from Nanak.” The Sambat year on the reverse is 57 years 
in advance of our year. Hence this rupee was struck in 1765 A. D. I have 
rupees of this type struck in Lahore, for the years 1822, ’25, ’26, ’27, ’28, ’30, 
’31, ’32, ’33 and ’34 There was an interruption in 1766 and ’77 {i. e. in 
1823 and ’24) caused by Ahmad Shah’s last descent on India. • There may 
be rupees for some of the missing years. But we can scarcely expect to 
find them for the years 1823 and ’24, S. Ahmad Shah invaded India for the 
last time then. During this invasion the ruler of Patiala received from 
