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Periodical article Periodical article Leiden University catalogue Leiden University catalogue WorldCat catalogue WorldCat
Title:The nineteenth-century gold 'mithqal' in West and North Africa
Author:Johnson, MarionISNI
Year:1968
Periodical:The Journal of African History
Volume:9
Issue:4
Pages:547-569
Language:English
Geographic terms:Maghreb
West Africa
Subjects:currencies
gold
history
1800-1899
External link:https://www.jstor.org/stable/180144
Abstract:When the first Islamic coinage was issued in Damascus at the end of the seventh century A.D. it was based on the Syrian gold dinar, and the coin became known as a mithqal ('weight' or 'the weight of something'). During the succeeding centuries, the various dynasties of Islam issued a great variety of gold dinars or mithqals. By the nineteenth century both the gold dinar and the name mithqal were obeolete in much of the Islamic world; but in the first quarter of that century some coins lingered on in use in West and North Africa, and the name mithqal for a unit of weight of gold-dust continued in use throughout the century in parts of West and North Africa and in a few places in the Middle East. Attempted is to discover, and to make sense of, the various values of the gold mithqal at different times and placee in West and North Africa during the nineteenth century. Ref.
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