CRUSADERS. Crusader Imitations of Islamic Dirhams. Dirham (Silver, 22 mm, 2.17 g, 8 h), Imitating an Ayyubid dirham of al-Salih Ismaiʿl (AH 635 / AD 1237 and AH 637-643 / AD 1239-1245) from Dimashq (Damascus), but probably struck in ʿAkka (Acre), AH [64]3 = 1245/6. Within a square, citing the ʿAbbasid caliph al-Mustansir billah (AH 623-640 / AD 1226-1242), ‘al-Imām / al-Mustanṣir / billāh Abū Jaʿfar / al-Manṣūr amīr al-muʾminīn’ (‘Imam al-Mustansir billah Abu Jaʿfar al-Mansur, Commander of the Believers’ in Arabic); in the margin, the reference to the prophet Muhammad replaced by the archangel Michael, ‘lā ilāha i/llā Allāh wa / Mīkhāʾil ra/sūl Allāh’ (‘There is no deity but God and Michael is the messenger of God’ in Arabic); cross in lower margin. Rev. Within a square, ‘al-malik al-Ṣāliḥ / ʿImād al-Dunyā wa al-Dīn / Ismāʿīl ibn Abī Bakr’ (‘King al-Salih ʿImad al-Dunya wa al-Din Ismaʿil son of Abu Bakr’ in Arabic); in the margin, ‘bism Allāh / ḍuriba bi Dimashq / sana thalāth wa / …’ (‘In the name of Allah. Struck in Dimashq in the year [46]3’ in Arabic); cross in upper margin. Bates & Metcalf 51. Malloy 6. Metcalf, Crusades, -. Wäckerlin 223. Very rare. Holed and somewhat rough, otherwise, very fine.


This is the rarest and arguably the most interesting of all Crusader imitations of Islamic Dirhams, as it replaces the name of the prophet Muhammad with that of the Archangel Michael. However, the objections of Odo of Chateauroux, Cardinal-Bishop of Tusculum (1244-1273) and Papal legate on the Seventh Crusade to the striking of coins with Islamic inscriptions and datings would eventually lead to their replacement with Christianized types.