Coining Koine: Reading Numismatic Images in the Context of Global Exchange

A miasma of mimesis plagues the study of artistic exchange across the Indian Ocean world of the early centuries CE. Active innovators and passive imitators give rise to zero-sum dynamics of "influence," "imitation," or "barbarization." Such views not only discount the agency and skill sets possessed by artists throughout the wider ancient world, but also overlook how transculturality operates—how so-called 'superficial' similarities of a stylistic koine can communicate both "globally" and "locally," looking both to the past and unfolding present. This chapter offers a corrective to these understandings by investigating aesthetic engagements with Roman imperial denarii and aurei once they arrived in the Indian subcontinent through long-distance exchange. After some brief comments on genuine Roman coins and their long lives in India, it turns to the production of imitative Roman coins and the consideration of their formal composition when designing coins minted in the name of dynasts ruling in India. Roman coins were not just a form of money in circulation, but also miniature objects produced in great numbers, valued for aspects of their materiality and their engaging images—elements which warranted replication to meet a wide range of demands and tastes. What we see on the surface is actually something more profound: dialogues within an increasingly interconnected ancient world.