TURKEY Ahmed I 1603-17 silver akche 1012 AH Kustantiniye

Description

Ahmed I came to the Ottoman throne in a violent period when palace intrigue was deadly. He was 13 years old on his accession, which meant he had little influence for a number of years. Several wars fought during his reign ended badly for the Ottomans. He tried to be pious and liberal, but was constrained by the politics and cultural trends of the times he lived in.

The earliest coins in the world were struck in Asia Minor, in modern Turkish territory. The Turks themselves arrived as nomads staring in the 9th centuriy AD. The Ottomans emerged as a dominant power in the 14th century. The Turkish Empire dissolved after World War I and a republic was established.

Middle East is, generally spealing, Morocco east to Afghanistan, Sudan in the south to Turkey in the north.

By “Modern World Coins” we mean here, generally, the round, flat, shiny metal objects that people have used for money and still do. “Modern,” though, varies by location. There was some other way they were doing their economies, and then they switched over to “modern coins,” then they went toward paper money, now we’re all going toward digital, a future in which kids look at a coin and say “What’s that?” We’ll say: “We used to use those to buy things.” Kids will ask “How?” The main catalog reference is the Standard Catalog of World Coins, to which the KM numbers refer.