1881.] C. J. Rodgers —On the Coins of the Sikhs. 81 
I have a rupee of tfrs same year with a similar obverse, but with the 
reverse containing, instead of Amritsar Xjf eAi| and instead of the hot dr, a 
gurz or mace. It will be seen at once that Anandgarh is spelt incorrectly. 
It ought to be eJfi}. (This place is the fort in Anandpur to which we 
have so often referred. It is a town at which an annual fair is held to 
which all fanatical Sikhs resort. At one of these fairs one of the most 
accomplished Panjabi scholars, the Rev. Mr. Janvier of the American 
Presbyterian Mission, was cruelly murdered by an Akali. ) The word 
too comes on this one. So here we have a first year of some new govern¬ 
ment or era. The katar and the gurz would seem to indicate that it was to 
be one of brute force. I cannot say what it refers to. Just then Sikhism 
was in a ferment of raids and excursions and internal broils. There was 
no one leader pre-eminent. Combination seems to have been the custom 
just then. This word is used by all the Mughal emperors on their rupees 
from the time of Shah Johan , instead of the figure 1, for the first year. So 
that the existence of this word in this position indicates that in this year 
some new rule was inaugurated. In fig. 4, pi. Y, we have on the obverse 
the figure r above the word JU3, and pr on the reverse, thus showing that 
this rule or reform or new administration lasted for some time. In all 
Mughal rupees the same rule is followed. The year of the Hejira is on 
one side and the year of the reign on the other : only as a rule the latter 
comes with the mint town and the former with the king’s name. 
It is of this time 1841 S. = 1784 A. 13. that Cunningham writes, 
“ The Sikhs were predominant from the frontiers of Oude to the Indus.” 
It was at this time that Maha Singh, the father of Ran jit Singh, entered 
on that series of moves which landed him the head of the Sikhs. His son 
Ranjit was born in 1780. He himself died young, at the age of 27 only, 
in 1792, during his siege of Gujrat. But the coin I am inclined to attri¬ 
bute to the Sikh ascendancy, rather than to Maha Singh. Ranjit Singh 
never put the year of his reign on his coins. 
Pigs. 5 and 6, pi. V, are reverses of Anandgarh coins of 1844 and 1846. 
I have one other of 1843 struck at the same place. 
Their obverses are all the same as that of fig. 1. 
The inscriptions on fig. 4 call for attention 
Obverse— 
Reverse— 
remains of 
j.** ci i ij-p'o! 
•» 
edj (A'i) 
(Jhl 
j(t ji c>j tS'* 
(t a) pr 
L 
& 
