Al-Amin's designated successor: the limitations of numismatic evidence. From: The Journal of the American Oriental Society | Date: January 1, 1996| Author: | COPYRIGHT 1996 American Oriental Society. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan.  All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group.Copyright information

Ancient coins have been used as historical evidence to trace the political history of ancient civilizations. Historians assert that in ancient Muslim culture, special coins containing honorific titles manifested the designation of a successor to a caliph. In the case of an Abbasid coin minted in Damascus in 194 A.H., however, the validity of using coinage to track major political actions has been questioned. The time and place of the minting of the coin does not coincide with written historical evidence of the time.

The appearance on Abbasid coinage of either a laqab (honorific title) or the ...