346 E. Thomas— The Initial Coinage of Bengal. — Ft. II. [No. 4, 
sataraktilca , or 100 -rati* weight,—a metric division which was reproduced 
and reaffirmed in the authorized tanlcah of the Pathan dynasty, and to which 
we have to allow a theoretical weight of 175 grains,—Dr. Hunter’s \ toldh 
will come out, to the exact second place of decimals, of the 4375 (175 -f- 4 
= 43*75), obtained from Mr. Stirling’s data. 
The determination of the true weight of the rati has done much both 
to facilitate and give authority to the comparison of the ultimately 
divergent standards of the ethnic kingdoms of India. Having discovered 
the guiding unit , all other calculations become simple, and present singularly 
convincing results, notwithstanding that the basis of all these estimates 
rests upon so erratic a test as the growth of the seed of the Gfunja creeper 
(Aims 'precatorius) , under the varied incidents of soil and climate. Never¬ 
theless, this small compact grain, checked in early times by other products 
of nature, is seen to have had the remarkable faculty of securing a uniform 
average throughout the entire continent of India, which only came to be 
disturbed when monarchs, like Slier Shah and Akbar, in their vanity, raised 
the weight of the coinage without any reference to the number of rat is 
inherited from Hindu sources as the given standard, officially recognized in 
the old, but altogether disregarded and left undefined in the reformed 
Muhammadan mintages. 
I may as well take this opportunity of disposing of the other technical 
questions bearing upon the general subject; and, without recapitulating the 
investigations elsewhere given at large, I may state generally, that I 
understand the rati to have been P75 grains, the 100 rati piece—reproduced 
in the ordinary Dihli tanlcali —175 grains. The liajput jital , composed of 
mixed silver and copper, preserved in the early Dihli currencies of the 
Muslims, is f-j in value of the 1*75 grain silver coin ; but the number of 
jitals in any given composite piece was dependent upon the proportional 
amount of the silver added to the ruling copper basis. The kani, like 
the jital is -g 1 ^ of the tanlcah ; but the lcani is found to be the practi¬ 
cal as well as the theoretical divisor, applicable alike to land and other 
measures, preserving its more special identity in the southern penin¬ 
sula. Both terms have now been found in conjunction on a single piece 
of metropolitan fabric, where the jital is authoritatively declared to 
be of the value of one Jcani.f In more advanced days under the Pathans, 
immense quantities of pieces were coined to meet the current exchange 
* Chronicles of Pathan Kings, pp. 3, 167, 223, 224 (note). Dr. A. Weber, in the 
Zeitchrift for 1861, p. 139, cites the parallel designation of Sa l a Krislinala, from the text 
of the Black Yajur Veda (circa 800 B.C.). The commentator uses the local name above 
quoted. 
t Numismatic Chronicle (x.s.) iv., p. 40, et seqq. J.R.A.S. (x.s.), II., pp. 150, 166; 
168. Chronicles of the Pathan Kings of Delili, pp. 161, 252. 
