Coins and tokens from ancient Ceylon

Coins are our principal source to elucidate both the pattern of trade between Sri Lanka and the western world in late antiquity and the island’s monetary and economic history of this period. Of the specimens discovered in Sri Lankan soil only two sorts were of significance: Indian silver punch-marked coins and their imitations were used as an all purpose money or general currency, whereas Late Roman “chicken feed copper” coins and their imitations functioned as special purpose money for essentially monastic purposes. The study first and foremost critically compiles, annotates and publishes – partly for the first time – the finds of Late Roman coins, ancient Indian and local coins and coin-like objects discovered in Sri Lanka from 1584 to 2005. This compilation is supplemented by a list of hoards of mediaeval Sinhalese and Chinese hoards and rounded off by a digest of findings of Late Roman coins in India.