ABSTRACT
Enigmatic Numismatics: Kings, Horses, and the Asvamedha Coin-type
Steven E. Lindquist
This paper deals with a long-standing interpretive problem scholars have in understanding the asvamedha coin-type, a coin-type initially minted during the reign of Samudragupta and then Kumaragupta I. The asvamedha is a yearlong royal sacrifice which centres around the release and subsequent suffocation of a horse and the asvamedha coins were supposedly minted to commemorate this event. The interpretative problem rests on certain purported inconsistencies in iconographic details found on these coins and the fact that the asvamedha coin-type appears unique among all other Gupta gold coins (which normally depict a specific king and a goddess figure). Through a close reading of the ritual manuals, combined with a thorough analysis of the iconographic details found on the coin-type, I show that the interpretative problem is actually a non-problem. Scholars, in their avoidance or misunderstanding of the ritual manuals, have universally overlooked a fundamental theme of the sacrifice which is itself depicted on the coin. If this is the case, then the asvamedha coin-type contains an intentional visual double entendre which makes this coin-type not so anomalous after all. I further suggest that images, like texts, are not simply "representational," but stand in complex relations to other texts and are themselves multi-vocalic, eliciting layers of meaning depending on how they are "read."