ABBASID, AL-MUQTADIR (295-320h), Dinar, Madinat Zaranj 302h. Obverse: without name of heir in field. Weight: 4.15g References: Bernardi 237Of RRR = Lloyd, Saffarids GZA302. About extremely fine and excessively rare. For much of the third century Zaranj had been the centre of the powerful Saffarid dynasty, whose armies had come within 40 miles of capturing Baghdad itself during the early 260s. By the late 290s, however, the dynasty’s power was shrinking rapidly as a number of rivals struggled for supremacy. Saffarid authority in the region was temporarily extinguished when the Samanids captured Zaranj in 298h, but there was still strong local support for the dynasty and yet another local warlord, Muhammad b. Hurmuz, seized power there in the name of a young scion of the Saffarid family. The Samanids quickly returned to suppress this revolt and duly retook Zaranj in 300h, leaving the Samanid amir Ahmad b. Isma‘il as the caliph’s designated governor of Sijistan. But Ahmad himself was assassinated in the following year causing turmoil in the Samanid lands, and the Samanid general, Simjur Dawati, was forced out of Zaranj in 301h. Meanwhile, news that the Samanids no longer controlled Sijistan had reached the ears of the caliph through a local finance officer. While al-Muqtadir had been happy to offer the Samanids a degree of support and encouragement against the Saffarids, who represented a common enemy, he was not inclined to leave them in control of Sijistan now that an opportunity had come to reassert caliphal control in the region. Prompt action by the caliph’s vizier saw al-Muqtadir’s envoys received with great ceremony in Zaranj later that year, and so from 301h until 304h coins of standard Abbasid type were struck there. Silver dirhams all bear the provincial name Sijistan, while the extremely rare gold dinars, all of which bear the date 302h, have that of the capital Zaranj. This is the only year for which Abbasid dinars of Zaranj are known.
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