The Coins & History Foundation is proud to announce the publication of a major new work explaining the history and impacts of the Islamic silver coins called “Dirhems.” The author, Jani Oravisjärvi, is an archaeologist currently working as a project researcher (University of Oulu) on The Silver and origins of the Viking Age -project. Jani is a former keeper of the numismatic collections at the National Museum of Finland and a former executive secretary and board member of the Finnish Numismatic Society.
The book is available for purchase at Suomen Moneta in Helsinki, Finland: https://www.suomenmoneta.fi/muut-tuotteet/dirhemin-synty-kirja
Here is a short excerpt from the book’s introduction:
“One group of coins was issued during the period 1300 years ago, which we we know today as the Viking Age. The coins that started it all are dirhems. Those Islamic silver coins weighing just under three grams changed the direction of history and ushered in a whole new chapter in coins and currency. Dirhems formed a continuous stream of silver flowing along the eastern road through Europe to the North for two hundred for a year from the early 800s to the early 1000s. Without dirhams, the Viking Age and others to follow would have looked very differently.”
“Despite their importance, dirhems and other money of early Islamic culture are not very well-known among the general public. Early Islamic money is the oldest witness to Arab and Islamic identity so they can also be approached, for example, from a cultural and religious history point of view. In many matters related to Arab and Islamic history money is an excellent – and sometimes even the only – group of known objects, whose provable value cannot be underestimated or disputed.”
To read an entire chapter from this Dirhem book in English, click here: https://coinsandhistoryfoundation.org/2021/03/15/dirhemin-synty-english-finnish/
To read that same chapter in its original Finnish, click here: https://coinsandhistoryfoundation.org/2021/03/15/dirhemin-synty-finnish/