ISLAMIC, Anatolia & al-Jazira (Post-Seljuk). Mengüjekids (Erzincan & Kermakh). Fakhr al-Din Bahram Shah, AH 560-622 / AD 1165-1225. Dirham (Bronze, 23 mm, 4.33 g, 9 h), Arzanjan (Erzincan), AH 579 = AD 1183/4. Head with long hair to left within a hexagon; to left and right, ‘Fakhr – al-Din’ (‘Fakhr al-Din’ in Arabic); in the margin, ‘ḍuriba bi Arzanjān fī sana tisʿ sabʿ[īn khamsa] miʾa’ (‘Struck in Arzanjan in the year 579’ in Arabic). Rev. Within a square, ‘malik al-umarā / shāh ghāzī / Bahrāmshāh’ (‘King of amirs, the holy warrior king, Bahramshah’ in Arabic); in the margin, ‘ibn Dāwūd / nāṣir / [amīr al-muʾ/minīn]’ (‘son of Daʾud, helper of the Commander of the Believers’ in Arabic). Album 1892.3. Rare. Light areas of weakness and with minor deposits, otherwise, very fine.



Marco Polo visited Arzanjan (modern Erzincan) only five year before this coin was issued, reporting that the 'the people [of Arzanjan] are Armenians', and that Arzanjan was the 'noblest of cities' and the See of an Armenian Archbishop.