ISLAMIC, Umayyad Caliphate. Uncertain period (post-reform), AH 77-132 / AD 697-750. Fals (Bronze, 20 mm, 4.18 g, 7 h), Tanukh. Album 189. Rare and in excellent condition for the issue. About extremely fine.


Tanukh does likely not refer to a mint but to the Banu Tanukh, an Arab tribe that lived in and around the Hauran. The Tanukhids were christianized in the 3rd and 4th centuries and fought the Persians and Muslims as Roman foederati until the disastrous battle of Yarmouk in 636, in which Khalid ibn al-Walid defeated the Byzantine emperor Heraklios and his local allies. The Tanukhids were subjected to Muslim rule thereafter, but they remained staunchly Christian for at least another century before finally converting to Islam under the Abbasid caliph Al-Mahdi.