Struck the Year of Saladin’s Death

335, Lot: 700. Estimate $300. Sold for $380. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

ISLAMIC, Anatolia & al-Jazira (Post-Seljuk). Artuqids (Mardin). Husam al-Din Yuluq Arslan. AH 580-597 / AD 1184-1200. Æ Dirhem (31mm, 13.86 g, 9h). Unnamed (Mardin?) mint. Dated AH 589 (Struck after 4 March AD 1193). Three standing figures around central female figure seated left in attitude of mourning; eight-rayed star to left / Name and titles of Abbasid caliph in three lines; name and title of Ayyubid overlord, Saif al-Din Abu Bakr in margins, name and titles of Husam al-Din Yuluq Arslan and AH date in outer margin. Whelan Type III, p. 97; S&S Type 35.2; Album 1829.3. Good VF, earthen dark brown patina.

From the Warden Family Collection.

Spengler and Sayles have argued that scene represents Virgo surrounded by planets and relates to an astronomical event of AD 1186 that was thought to portend calamitous events (corroborated by the death of Saladin in 589).