Ugly Yet Popular: the Remarkably Long Life of the Safavid Coins of Hoveyza

What is it about?

The aim of the work is to identify the reasons for the long circulation of one very special Safavid coins, the mohammadi of Hoveyza. Their religious central legend ("Ali is the friend of Allah") caused a special religious attitude towards them in the Shiʿi environment, as well as the long and widespread use of their imitations as “bad money”, that dominated in the Iranian markets during the seventeenth–nineteenth centuries to protect silver outflow from Iran.

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