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and sulphur. This coinage, therefore, as Dr. Flight remarks, "essentially consists of an alloy of copper and nickel," the proportions differing but little from that of the 5 and 10 centime pieces of Belgium, which are composed of 70-4 of copper and 25.55 of nickel. Much interest was excited by this discovery, as "nickel was first shown to be a metal by Cronstedt in 1751." But although the use of nickel is comparatively recent in Europe, yet, as Dr. Flight observes, it has "formed a very constant constituent of some of the alloys known to the Chinese, especially packfony, tutenag, and white copper. The last alloy is composed of copper 794, nickel, 16.02, and iron 4:58, which is almost the same as that of the Indo-Grecian and Belgian alloys. Dr. Flight subsequently made a qualitative analysis of another white coin of Euthydemus, two coins of Agathokles, and one of Pantaleon, all of which gave precisely the same results, as they were found to contain much copper, and a considerable amount of nickel, with a little iron, a trace of tin, and no silver.

It would be very interesting if we could ascertain from whence this nickel was procured. I incline to the opinion that it must have come from China. Quintus Curtius, however, mentions that, near the junction of the Five Panjâb Rivers, Alexander received from the Oxydracæ and Malli, a present of 100 talents of "white iron," (ferri candidi). I conclude that this was certainly not tin, which is a soft metal, and was besides very well known to the Greeks. But as nickel is both hard and magnetic, as well as white, it might be justly described as white iron. In the Greek Anthology also I find mention

2 Vit. Alexand., ix. 8.

of an "Indian brass as white as silver," by the poet Krinagoras, who was a contemporary of Strabo.3

Χάλκεον ἀργύρεῳ με πανείκελον, Ινδικὸν ἔργον,
Ολπην, ἡδίστου ξείνιου εἰς ἑτάρου,

Ημαρ, ἐπεὶ τὸ δε σεῖο γενέθλιον, ὑιὲ Σίμωνος,
Πέμπει γηθομένῃ σὺν φρενὶ Κριναγόρης.

Which I translate as follows:

"This drinking-cup of Indian brass,
As silver white, Krinagoras,

To Simon's son, his best of friends,
A loving birth-day present sends."

I think it possible that the names of "white iron,” and "white or silvery brass," like that of "white copper," may refer to one of the Chinese alloys of nickel. Commerce has always been active between India and China, and it was very easy for a merchant to reach the Panjab and Kabul from the western coast of India. One of the Buddhist legends in fact refers to the shipwreck of Káka-Prabhásan, a "merchant of Taxila," on the east coast of India.

At what value these nickel coins passed current can only be conjectured; but it seems probable that they may have been oboli, as I notice that the three nickelstriking kings have no silver oboli, while, on the contrary, their contemporary Antimachus I., as well as their successors Demetrius and Eukratides, all have silver oboli, and no nickel coins. The one would therefore appear to have been intended as a substitute for the other; but the nickel coins soon fell into disuse, either from some inconvenience, or from the difficulty of procuring a

3

Anthologia Græca. Lipsia, vi. 261. With reference to the name of Olpe I may mention that the relic-caskets found in the Buddhist Topes of the Panjab are now called Harpa.

sufficient supply of the metal. No trace of nickel has yet been discovered in any of the purely Indian coinages.

I now come to the consideration of the influence which the previously existing Indian money had upon the monetary system of the Greeks, who ruled over the Kabul valley and North-west India. The monetary system of Athens is well known; but for the purpose of comparison with that of India it is necessary to give the names and weights of the various coins of both systems in some detail.

The silver drachma was the unit of the Athenian money. Its exact weight has not been absolutely determined; but it is generally admitted to have been somewhat over 67 English grains. For the sake of convenience of calcula- tion I have adopted the value of 672 English grains, which differs by only one-hundredth of a grain from the mean value deduced by no less than eleven of the principal writers on the subject:—

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The learned Böckh adopts the valuation of Barthelemy of 67.24 English grains, which is almost the same as the mean value just obtained. In the Masson collection at the East India Museum there is a bronze astragalus, or knuckle-bone, weighing 402 grains, which I take to be a weight of 6 drachmas, or one-thousandth part of a talent. If this assignment is correct, the astragalus gives exactly

67 grains to the drachma. I believe therefore that the value which I have adopted of 67.2 English grains is as nearly accurate as it is now possible to determine. The ⚫ convenience of this value is very great; for it is not only a finite fraction itself, but it is continually divisible by 2, as a finite fraction, down to 0.7 of a grain, or one-sixteenth of an obolus. It also gives the whole number of 112 grains for 10 oboli, and fixes the Phoenician drachma at 56 grains, the Macedonian drachma at 112 grains, and the Hebrew shekel at 224 grains, all in whole numbers. It makes its own talent equal to 57.6 English pounds, with a finite fraction, and makes other talents equally compact, and therefore readily convertible into English money.

The gold coin of Alexander was the stater, a piece of 2 Attic drachmas in weight, or 1344 grains, and the counterpart of the Persian daric.

The silver coins of Alexander and his successors, the Greeks of Syria, Bactriana, and India, were the following multiples and divisions of the drachma :

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At the Borrell sale there was sold a hemiobolion of Athens weighing 5.7 grains.

There are two specimens of the Tetartobolion in the British Museum, weighing only 2-5 grains each.

Specimens of all these denominations are found amongst the coins of the Greek princes of Bactriana and India, excepting only Nos. 1, 8, and 11.

The copper coins of the Seleukidæ, the successors of Alexander in Syria, adhere very closely to the weights of the silver money, the unit being the chalkous of about one drachma in weight. The actual weights vary very much, as indeed might be expected in copper coins. Amongst 145 specimens which I have weighed, I find large coins of Seleukus I. ranging from 59 to 70 and 73 grains, and smaller ones of 35 and 19 grains:-large coins of Antiochus I. from 57 to 68, and smaller ones from 30 to 35, the lowest being 19 grains. Other classes range up to 130 grains, 190 grains, and from 261 to 273 grains, and in the single case of Antiochus IV., Epiphanes, up to 518, 551, and 563 grains. The mean of five of these large coins would give a tetradrachmon of 269-2 grains, and a drachma of 673, or only one-tenth of a grain higher than the standard which I have adopted. I conclude therefore that the copper coins of the Seleukidæ followed the same system of weights that was used for the gold and silver money. The chalkous or copper unit would therefore be equal to 1 drachma in weight, or 67.2 grains, which gives the rate of silver to copper as 48 to 1, as 6 obols x 8 chalki give 48 chalki to the drachma. As the rate in India at the same period was 50 to 1, I have no hesitation in adopting the above rate of 48 to 1 for the copper coins of the Seleukidæ of Syria, as well as for the Greek kings of Bactria. According to this conclusion the weights of the various multiples and divisions of the chalkous will be as follows: :

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