COIN OF THE MONTH

COIN OF THE MONTH
June 2026

The Chandragupta II Archer Type Gold Dinar
Gupta Empire · c. 375–415 CE
The Coin That Named the ARCHIER Scale

There are coins that circulate. There are coins that are collected. And then there are coins that change the way an entire civilisation is understood. The Chandragupta II Archer Type Gold Dinar belongs to the third category. It is not merely a gold coin from the fourth century. It is a declaration — struck in metal — of the confidence, artistry, and imperial grandeur of the Gupta Golden Age. It is the coin that gave the ARCHIER Scale its name. And it is the coin with which AINCERT begins its Coin of the Month series.

The Gupta Empire, founded by Sri Gupta around 240 CE and brought to its first great peak by Chandragupta I in 320 CE, reached the absolute summit of its power and cultural achievement under Chandragupta II, who ruled from approximately 375 to 415 CE. History knows him by his earned title — Vikramaditya, meaning Sun of Valour. He inherited an already powerful empire from his father Samudragupta, whom the colonial historian V.A. Smith famously called the Napoleon of India for his extraordinary military campaigns documented in the Allahabad Pillar Inscription. But where Samudragupta was primarily a conqueror, Chandragupta II was a builder — of empire, of culture, and of a legacy that would be studied two thousand years after his death.

His military achievement that most directly concerns Indian numismatics was the defeat of the Shaka Western Kshatrapas between approximately 388 and 409 CE. The Shakas had controlled Gujarat and the western coast of India for centuries, and their elimination by Chandragupta II gave the Gupta Empire access to the prosperous ports of the Arabian Sea — Bharuch, Sopara, Cambay — through which the Roman trade in gold, wine, glass, and textiles flowed into India. This access to western trade wealth poured directly into the Gupta treasury and funded the extraordinary cultural patronage that defines the Golden Age. The Navaratnas — the nine gems of Chandragupta II's court — included Kalidasa, whose Abhijnanasakuntalam and Meghaduta represent the peak of Sanskrit classical literature; Aryabhata, who proposed a heliocentric model of the solar system, calculated pi to four decimal places, and explained solar and lunar eclipses through rational scientific reasoning; and Varahamihira, whose Brihat Samhita stands as an encyclopaedic achievement in astronomy and natural science. The Chinese Buddhist pilgrim Fa Hien, who visited India during Chandragupta II's reign between 399 and 414 CE, described a prosperous and peaceful civilisation where the roads were safe, the people were free, and no passport was required to travel across the empire. It was a world that felt, in Fa Hien's account, like a civilisation at its most confident and generous.

It is within this context that the Archer Type Gold Dinar must be understood. Chandragupta II issued several coin types during his reign — the Chakravikrama type showing him slaying a lion, the Horseman type, the Couch type, the Chhatra type — but the Archer type is widely regarded by numismatists as the finest and most iconic of them all. On the obverse, Chandragupta II stands in a powerful frontal pose, his left hand holding a bow and his right hand drawing an arrow at full extension. The king is shown wearing an elaborate crown and royal garments, with a Garuda standard — the divine eagle of Vishnu — rising behind him. The legend in Brahmi script reads Chandragupta, and on some specimens the full title Vikramaditya is present. The reverse shows the goddess Lakshmi seated on a lotus, holding a diadem and a lotus flower, with the legend Sri Vikramah in Brahmi script confirming the king's earned title. The coin is struck in high-purity gold, typically between 7.5 and 8 grams, and the craftsmanship of the finest known specimens reveals a level of die-cutting skill and artistic refinement that was not surpassed in Indian coinage for centuries.

The Archer type is significant for several numismatic reasons beyond its beauty. It represents the mature phase of Gupta coinage, when the artistic tradition established by Samudragupta — who was himself depicted playing the veena on his Lyrist type coins, unique in Indian numismatic history — had reached its fullest expression. The naturalistic portraiture, the dynamic posture of the king, the detailed reverse goddess, and the clean Brahmi inscriptions place this coin at the intersection of Indian artistic tradition and the influence of Kushan coinage that the Guptas had absorbed and transformed. The Kushan emperors had introduced the tradition of realistic ruler portraiture on Indian coins, derived from the Hellenistic Greek tradition brought by the Indo-Greek kings centuries earlier. The Guptas inherited this tradition and made it entirely their own, and the Archer type Dinar of Chandragupta II stands as the masterpiece of that synthesis.

In the world of modern numismatics, the finest specimens of the Chandragupta II Archer Type Gold Dinar are among the most sought-after ancient Indian coins. They appear in major international auctions including those conducted by Marudhar Arts, the leading numismatic auction house in India, and command prices that reflect both their rarity and their historical significance. The NGC — Numismatic Guaranty Corporation — has graded certified examples, and these slabbed specimens represent the highest standard of authentication and preservation currently available to collectors.

It was one such specimen — an Archer Type Gold Dinar acquired through Marudhar Arts — that became the foundation of AINCERT's grading framework. When Ujjwal BU Pant, Founder President of AINCERT, held this coin and studied it, he recognised that no Indian grading standard existed that could properly describe what he was looking at. The Western grading scales — the Sheldon Scale created by William Herbert Sheldon in 1949, the NGC and PCGS systems built upon it — were designed for American and European coins on Western metal with Western striking traditions. They had no category for the specific characteristics of Gupta gold coinage, for the particular way a Gupta die was cut, for the distinctive luster of high-purity ancient Indian gold, for the striking method and planchet preparation unique to the Gupta mint tradition.

That recognition produced the ARCHIER Scale. Named after the Archer Type Gold Dinar — the coin that made the gap visible — the ARCHIER Scale runs from 1 to 100 and was designed from the ground up for Indian coins, by an Indian collector, for the Indian numismatic community. It is India's first original coin grading standard. And it begins here, with this coin, in this month, on this page.

The Chandragupta II Archer Type Gold Dinar is graded on the ARCHIER Scale across five criteria — Metal Preservation, Strike Quality, Surface Integrity, Die Sharpness, and Eye Appeal — each scored out of 20 for a total of 100. A perfect specimen with full original luster, sharp die details on both obverse and reverse, no contact marks, complete Brahmi legends, and overwhelming visual impact would receive an ARCHIER-100. Such a coin does not exist in any known collection. The finest certified examples known today would grade in the ARCHIER-85 to ARCHIER-92 range, reflecting the extraordinary preservation of the best specimens while acknowledging the natural characteristics of ancient handstruck coinage.

Chandragupta II died around 415 CE. His son Kumaragupta I succeeded him and founded Nalanda University around 450 CE. The Gupta Empire would begin its decline under Skandagupta, who spent his reign and his treasury repelling the Huna invasions from Central Asia. By 550 CE the empire that had produced this coin was gone. But the coin itself survived — in hoards, in collections, in museum cases, in the hands of collectors who understood what they were holding.

Two thousand years after this coin was struck, a twelve year old boy in Noida looked at one and decided that India needed its own way of describing it.

That is why this coin is first.

The Coin of the Month is a monthly feature by AINCERT — All India Numismatics Council of Educational Research and Training. Each month AINCERT selects one significant coin from Indian numismatic history and presents a complete study for collectors, students, and historians. The ARCHIER Scale, the Sher Scale, and the Dawk Scale are original grading standards created by Ujjwal BU Pant, Founder President, AINCERT-001.

sites.google.com/view/aincert · aincert.org (coming soon) · Founded 30 April 2026

Coin of the Month — July 2026
Rajendra Chola I — Silver Proof 2025

Rajendra Chola I ruled the Chola Empire from 1014 CE to 1044 CE and was one of the most powerful emperors in Indian history. Under his rule the Chola Empire stretched across the entire southern peninsula, Sri Lanka, the Maldives, and extended its naval reach into Southeast Asia. In 1025 CE he launched the most ambitious naval expedition in ancient Indian history, sending his fleet across the Bay of Bengal to attack the Srivijaya Empire of Sumatra and the Malay peninsula. The expedition returned victorious, bringing tribute from kingdoms as far as the Malay peninsula and parts of modern Thailand. It remains the greatest act of Indian naval power in recorded history.

In 2025, one thousand years after that expedition, the India Government Mint issued a commemorative silver proof coin in his honour. The coin is sealed in its original government packaging and is part of the AINCERT collection.

The AINCERT collection holds this coin as one of its key modern proof issues. It sits alongside ancient coins spanning 300 BCE to the present — a collection that reaches from the Mahajanapada period to the present day. The Rajendra Chola I proof connects the modern India Government Mint to a ruler who proved that India was not merely a land power but a maritime civilisation capable of projecting force and influence across the entire Bay of Bengal.

Coin of the Month — August 2026
Akbar Gold Mohur | AH985 (1577 CE) | Jaunpur Mint
NGC MS-63 | 10.90g | Mughal Empire

The August 2026 Coin of the Month is the Akbar gold mohur struck at the Jaunpur mint in AH985, corresponding to 1577 CE, in the twenty-second year of Akbar's reign. It is graded MS-63 by the Numismatic Guaranty Company and weighs 10.90 grams, certified under NGC number 8172406-001. Akbar the Great ruled the Mughal Empire from 1556 to 1605, a reign of nearly half a century that transformed India politically, administratively, and culturally. By 1577, Akbar had already conquered Gujarat, consolidated Bengal, and was in the process of building Fatehpur Sikri. His coins from this period reflect an empire at its administrative peak. The gold mohur was the highest denomination in the Mughal monetary system, used for state transactions, gifts to nobles, and the payment of the highest-ranking mansabdars. Jaunpur was one of Akbar's most important eastern mints. The city had been the capital of the independent Sharqi Sultanate before its conquest by the Lodis and then the Mughals, and its mint continued to produce high-quality coinage under imperial supervision. A mohur from Jaunpur is a coin of the eastern empire, in the direction of Bengal, Bihar, and the expanding frontier. The obverse of this coin carries the Kalima in Arabic script, the Islamic declaration of faith, in bold flowing naskh calligraphy. The reverse carries the mint name Jaunpur and the regnal year. Mughal gold mohurs carry no portrait, per Islamic tradition, making calligraphic quality the primary measure of artistic achievement. On this specimen, graded MS-63 with only minor contact marks and full original surfaces, the calligraphy is sharp, the fields clean, and the flan well-struck. For the AINCERT collection, this mohur is the anchor of the Mughal chapter. A 16th-century gold coin from a politically significant mint, in exceptional certified condition, linking the collection from the IVC gold disks of 3000 BCE through the Gupta empire to the high Mughal period. The story of Indian coinage is unbroken.