Old fur rupee weight

[malj1]

Minimum legal weight of oblique milled old Fur Rupee 171.198 grs uniface bronze 30.2mm 11.0g

[capnbirdseye]

Very interesting , I wonder if it refers to the Farrukhabad Rupee?

[capnbirdseye]

Looking at the weights for Farrukhabad rupees the oblique milling one should be 11.2100g, presumably the coin weight is given in grains

[Figleaf]

Chalmers says that before 1835, the legal gross weights in grains were:

Bengal or sicca: 176 grs.
Old Bombay: 179 grs.
Madras or Arcot: 166.477 grs.

After 1835, the company rupee came in 180 grs (1 tola).

As far as I know, the Farrukhabad rupee was struck 1806-1819 and its official weight was 173 grs.

Peter

[EWC]

Princep gives the issue weight at 173 grains, but the legal (I assume = minimum) at 172.352g

All rather interesting, since this weight allows more wear than that. 

Either way EIC allowance for wear was very small - a bit of a swindle really, since underweight coin was paid in as bullion, with a loss of about 10% on the alloy.

This weight allows for more wear than Princep records, maybe shows there was debate about how hard to press the matter?

The late Marie Martin suggested Sher Shah rigged his weight system to get all prior tankas knocked down to bullion rates - so EIC seems to be doing something similar.........

[EWC]

The Steven's collection contained weights for both redemption standards - both marked 'old'...........

http://baldwin.co.uk/coins-of-india/OtherMints/FarrukhabadSilverWeight1806.htm

http://baldwin.co.uk/coins-of-india/OtherMints/FarrukhabadSilverWeight1806_1.htm

Paul does not mention this matter in his 2007 ONS piece - maybe he has elsewhere?

[Figleaf]

Could it be that when Prinsep says minimum weight, he means legal weight minus tolerance, in other words the minimum acceptable weight at which newly struck coins could be issued? I could see the utility of a piece like this in the Farrukhabad mint used as a counterweight for a quick check of whether a coin fell within the margins of the tolerance...

Peter

[EWC]

Could it be that when Prinsep says minimum weight, he means legal weight minus tolerance, in other words the minimum acceptable weight at which newly struck coins could be issued? I could see the utility of a piece like this in the Farrukhabad mint used as a counterweight for a quick check of whether a coin fell within the margins of the tolerance...

That would make more sense to me – but it does not seem to fit the facts.  I attach text from Princep, and for comparison, from Selgin concerning the British 1816 recoinage.  Note that old coin came in at par even though 22.5% underweight in the British recoinage.  In India, old coin was being refused as coin if more than 0.375% down!

The ambiguity I see concerns the words "deficiency" and "bullion".   Much of the British coin was 100 years old and very worn.  The Farrukhabad coin was quite recent, and wear would be small.  So if payees just had to pay for weight deficiency – the cost would not be great.  But bullion tends to mean 99.99% silver – and I assume the alloy of the old Fur coin was similar to the new – thus about 15/180 alloy = 8% plus.  So if the coin really is taken as bullion it's a big loss to the payer.