April 26, 2012 – Joe Cribb, whom „Felicitas“ seeks to honour, needs no introduction to any enthusiast of coins and paper money of Asia, specially of the Indian subcontinent. As a curator of South Asians Coins in the Department of Coins and Medals in the British Museum, and lately the Keeper of this department, Joe has had a ‘hand’ in a variety of numismatic activities. Starting with Chinese coins, Joe moved to many other themes and subjects within the broader range of ‘Oriental’ numismatics and history, making invaluable contributions to highly controversial subject areas, like the inception of coinage in the Indian subcontinent and the chronological questions facing complex coinages in Central Asia. Significantly, Joe Cribb’s academic interests not just centre around the broad theme of ‘Money’, which encompasses numismatics, but also go much beyond.
Covering a vast time and space, the essays here deal with the most ancient of the sub-continental coinages as well as those that deal with the most modern and conventional forms of money, like banknotes. Among other specificities, the essays explore socio-historical themes associated with coinage, study iconography through coins, examine royal as well as religious coins icons seen on Kushan coins, offer fresh interpretation of the ‘Lion Pillar’ inscription from Mathura, and highlight the role/utility of coins in historical reconstruction from a conceptual perspective, analyzing the deployment of coins to underline archaeological and historical periods. Several other themes examined here include minting technology in Mughal India, pagoda coins of South East India, Kuninda and Kota coins of the Punjab, or how coins were used as a tool of diplomacy in the colonial India.
Shailendra Bhandare and Sanjay Garg (ed.), Felicitas. Essays in Numismatics Epigraphy and History in Honour of Joe Cribb. Reesha Books International 2011, 500 p., Colour Plates, ISBN: 8189752081, $90.00 (includes free airmail shipping).
Contents: 1. Coinage, Prestige and Identity: From Rome to Persepolis and China / Michael Alram. 2. Linking the Past: Overstruck Coins and the Chronology of the Satavahanas / Shailendra Bhandare. 3. Kankali Tila and Kushan Chronology / Robert Bracey. 4. Fascination with the Past: Ancient Persia on the Coins and Banknotes of Iran / Vesta Sarkhosh Curtis.1 5. Reinterpretation of a Samatata Coin – The First Numismatic Depiction of Bodhisattva / Manjushri John S. Deyell. 6. A hoard of punch-marked coins from Mathura(?) / Elizabeth Errington. 7. Ten thoughts on the Mathura Lion capital reliquary / Harry Falk. 8. Looking For Tyche: On the Tracks of a Syncretism from Greece to Gandhara / Christine Frohlich. 9. The Raj and the Rajas: a Tale of Numismatic Diplomacy / Sanjay Garg. 10. Minting Technology in Mughal India / Najaf Haider. 11. Aspects of Human Society from the earliest Punch-marked Coinages of the Indian Subcontinent / Terry Hardaker. 12. Coins and Commerce in Bihar in Seventeenth Century: Some Reflections / Syed Ejaz Hussain. 13. A Review of the Pagoda Coins of South East India during the Nayaka and Early Colonial Period / Barbara Mears. 14. Harasri: A New King of Ancient Almora / Wilfried Pieper. 15. Coins as History: Kuninda and Kota coins of Punjab / Himanshu Prabha Ray. 16. The Coinage of Samudra Pasai / Nicholas Rhodes and Vasilijs Mihailovs. 17. History of the Coin Collection of the Bengal Sultans in the British Museum / Sutapa Sinha. 19. The Crowns of Kanishka’s Bronze Coins and Some Additional Shiva Images on Kushan Coins / Pankaj Tandon. 20. Onomastic, Title and Chronology of the Turgesh Kaghans / Francois Thierry. 21. Famous and Not-so-famous People Associated with the Royal Asiatic Society / Helen Wang. Contributors.
Shailendra Bhandare works as Assistant Keeper at the Heberden Coin Room, Ashmolean Museum, Oxford. He is also a member of faculty of Oriental Studies at the University of Oxford.
Dr Sanjay Garg is the editor of Numismatic Digest the research journal of the Indian Institute of Research in Numismatic Studies.
To order the book at Vedams Books, please click here.