Nubian or Beja silver pendant

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Nubian or Beja silver pendant

Posted by Alaa eddine SAGID on July 28, 2011 at 4:58pm

I posted this pendant following an interesting discussion about the "poor's people" jewelry. This jewel is actually copiying an old spanish "REAL" or an austrian "THALER" wich were at a time the international monney used in worldwide trade even in very remote areas. Their intrinsic value of silver have made people melting them to craft jewelry and even adopting as regular componants (such as in yemen) making them very desirable and thus prone to be copied such as in this case. Following local demand, smiths crafted lightweight pendants in the shape of these coins and one can see the naive shape of the royal effigy copied from the original coin

Comments

Sigrid van Roode August 20, 2011 at 12:18pm

Oh this one is lovely! It is actually an imitation of the Spanish pillar dollar (columnario or colonnato, like the one you have on your kirdan) which was indeed quite famous. Especially in the south of Egypt, where it was even more popular than the Maria Theresia Thaler. It was even so popular that the Arabic derivate of its name (spanish real -> arabic riyal) became the word of choice to indicate official coins, whereas the austrian thaler in turn is the basis for the word dollar.

Usually, it is possible to discern between imitations of the pillar dollar or the MTT and this one is certainly a 'pillar dollar'. There is one Egyptian variety in which the bust of the Spanish king from the pillar dollar is imitated on the one side (complete with his moustache!) and the Habsburg coat of arms of the MTT on the other!
Alaa eddine SAGID August 20, 2011 at 12:26pm

I wasn't sure enough wich coin was copied here. thanx for the info.

My grand mother used to have a very thin gold large pendant copiying a maria theresa thaler (very realistic).

It was a central pendant of a french napoleon's gold coins necklace and she brought it with her from an early pilgrimage in Mecca, Saudi arabia....it always puzzled me until i knew it was big tradition to copy such coins in east africa and southern arabia
Sigrid van Roode August 20, 2011 at 12:32pm

Wow, how interesting and how great to have such information from your own family. Thank you for sharing!

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Nubian or Beja silver pendant

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