-40%
In the Name of God - When Islam and Christianity Clashed 8 Coins from Holy Wars
$ 131.46
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Description
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In the Name of God
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When Islam and Christianity Clashed
A Collection of Eight Coins from
History’s Greatest Holy Wars
4 - Silver - 1 Billon, 1 Copper, 2 bronze
In a Beautiful Cherry Wood Display Box
with a
"
Certificate of Authenticity
”
This remarkable collection is a numismatic history of eight pivotal Holy Wars
between the Muslims and the Christians
He found his spiritual calling relatively late in life, and quickly developed a large following. He preached on the virtues of monotheism, generosity toward the poor and others in need, and kindness toward others. His ministry was seen as a threat by the religious authorities in the city where he lived and preached, and those in power persecuted him and his followers. He was widely viewed as the last in a series of prophets, preaching the ultimate Word of God.
That description applies to both Jesus and Muhammad, who had much more in common than is widely assumed. Given the similarity of their message, it is both ironic and tragic that Christians and Muslims have been at war almost constantly since 610 CE, when Muhammad began his ministry in Mecca. This remarkable collection is a numismatic history of eight pivotal Holy Wars.
#1: The Battle of Hunayn, 630 CE
Twenty years after beginning his ministry, Muhammad and his army conquered the Arab city of Mecca, a turning point in the rise of Islam. The city remains the epicenter of Muslim life 14 centuries later. Those Arabs who did not surrender to Muhammad at Mecca did so after the Battle of Hunayn, fought soon after. It is one of only two battles referenced in the Koran.
Coin: Arab Muslim Empire bronze pseudo-byzantine fals; O: Standing emperor; R: Denomination "M" (indicates "40" nummia); W:
2-5 g; D: 15-23 mm
#2: The Battle of Tours, 732 CE
After a century of incredible success expanding the Caliphate by Mohammad, the Rightly Guided Caliphs, and the subsequent Umayyads, the spread of Islam into Europe was thwarted by Charles "The Hammer" Martel at the Battle of Tours in the south of France. The Franks won the battle despite not having cavalry. Historians describe Tours as "the turning point of one of the most important epochs in the history of the world."
Coin: Umayyad silver dirham; O: Arabic script w/mint names, & family titles; R: Arabic script w/dates and declaration of faiths; W:
2.4-2.9 g; D: 23-26 mm
#3: The First Crusade, 1096-1099
Pope Urban II called upon Christians to retake the Holy Lands from the infidels. The Franks heeded the call, retaking important Middle Eastern cities from Muslim forces, and establishing a Latin Kingdom in Jerusalem. While subsequent Crusades would prove less successful, the Latin knights would hold Jerusalem for almost 200 years, taking as their wives Christian princesses from Armenia.
Coin: Ayyubid copper fals; O: Arabic script w/mint names, & family titles; R: Arabic script w/dates and declaration of faith’s:
1.9-4 g; D: 18-23 mm
#4: The Battle of Las Navas de Tolosa, 1212
Islamic forces began the conquest of the Iberian penninsula in 711. They would hold most of that territory until 1212, when the Almohads were defeated by Christian forces led by King Alfonso VIII of Castile at the Battle of Las Navas de Tolosa. While the Muslims would not be repulsed from the whole of Spain until 1492, this battle was the turning point; after the defeat, Muslim influence in Iberia waned, never to recover.
Coin: Spanish Almohad dynasty silver sq. dirham; O: Arabic script w/mint names, & family titles; R: Arabic script w/dates and declaration of faiths; W: 1.3-1.5 g; D:
13.5 X 14.2 mm
#5: The Battle of Kosovo, 1389
Long a battleground between Islam and the West, the Balkans were taken by the Ottomans at the battle at Kosovo Field, three miles north of Priština, on June 15, 1389. The Serbs and Turks fought almost to the death, with most of the soldiers and both commanders—Serbian Prince Lazar and the Ottoman Sultan Murad I—perishing in combat. The Ottomans prevailed, by virtue of their greater numbers, but lost so many men that their westward progress was halted. The Serbs, meanwhile, were left with inadequate numbers of troops to defend their holdings. Serbia did not fully free itself from the Ottoman yoke until 1835.
Coin: Turkey Ottoman Bayezit 1st silver akche; O: Name and patronymic R: Arabic script w/dates and declaration of faiths; W:
1-1.2 g;
D:
11-13.3 mm
#6: The Fall of Constantinople, 1453
The seat of the mighty Byzantine Empire, for centuries a Christian bulwark against Turkish designs on the West, Constantinople was the greatest city in Christendom for a thousand years—and a prize coveted by the Ottomans. After seven centuries of trying, the Muslims finally took the Emerald City in 1453, effectively ending the Byzantine Empire in the process.
Coin: Turkish Ottoman Empire silver akche; O: Arabic script w/mint names, & family titles; R: Arabic script w/dates and declaration of faiths:
W: 0.1-0.6 g
; D:
7.4-11.5 mm
#7: The Battle of Lepanto, 1571
The Ottoman sultan’s vaunted fleet met the combined naval forces of the Catholic maritime states at Lepanto in one of the most important naval battles of all time. Led by John of Austria, a mighty fleet of 212 ships, conveying some 28,500 soldiers and 1,815 guns, sailed south, where it met an even larger Ottoman force of 251 ships in the Gulf of Patras, near the Ottoman port city of Lepanto. The Christians had six warships called galleasses, the likes of which the Turks had never seen. Unlike regular galleys, which only fired from the bow, galleasses were equipped with guns on the side of the ship. Almost immediately, the Turks made a tactical blunder. Believing the galleasses to be supply ships, they attacked them—and suffered heavy losses. This paved the way for a rout by the Holy League. Before retreating, the Ottomans lost 210 ships—most of its vaunted navy. Fifteen thousand Turks were killed, and 3,500 captured. The Ottoman Empire never fully recovered.
Coin: Italy Genoa billon minute; O: Cross with fleur-de-lis in one of the angles; R: Stylized gate; W:
0.5-0.7 g
; D:
13-14.9 mm
#8: The Battle of Vienna, 1683
At its height, under Suleiman the Magnificent in the mid-16th century, the Ottomans possessed arguably the most powerful kingdom on earth, a vast and diverse dominion that included most of Northern Africa, the whole of the Balkan peninsula, Persia, Arabia, the Crimea, and the Holy Land, as well as modern-day Turkey. By the end of the 17th century, however, the Empire had begun its slow but inexorable decline. The Ottoman sultan Mehmed IV suffered repeated crushing defeats by the combined forces of Europe, including the disastrous battle that ended the protracted siege of Vienna in 1683. By 1700, the Ottoman Empire had lost Hungary, Transylvania, Slavonia, and Dalmatia to its enemies. Its expansion into Europe was halted for good.
Coin: Ottoman Empire Suleyman 2nd bronze mangir; O: A Tughra, the official insignia of the Turkish sultan; R: Inscription of title, name, and date; W:
1.3-2.5 g
; D:
18.5-19.5 mm
The conflict between Christianity and Islam is readily visible in the coinage of the two faiths. Because of the strict prohibition on graven images, Muslim coins feature no portraits. Instead, the emphasis is on calligraphic writing, geometric shapes, and, in the later Ottoman types, ornate signatures. This is in sharp
contrast to the Christian coinage, which feature representational art. The cross is prominently featured. There were a wide range of Medieval-era cross types. Finally, because the Muslim world was more technologically and artistically advanced than Christendom for the whole of the Middle Ages, the Islamic coins tend to be of superior craftsmanship, while the Christian ones are more crude.
Data:
Box measures: 7.25" x 5.5" x 1.25"
Coin type and grade may vary somewhat from image
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