Numismatic Auction #20

ARAB-BYZANTINE: Standing Emperor, ca. 680-700+, AE fals (4.16g), "pseudo-Damascus ", A-3522.1, Milstein—, bird left and blank area right of figure / cursive m, N left, ANO right, star above, Arabic word below, bold VF, RRR. The pellets ( "eyes ") inside the cursive m confirm that this apparently unpublished type belongs to the curious pseudo-Damascus series. The first 3 letters of the Arabic word compare to the first 3 letters of the mint name Adhra'at (for Deraa) as it appears on the post-reform Umayyad fulus of that mint. It seems plausible that despite the different final 2 letters, the word is a form of the city name Dar'at without the 'ayn, perhaps an obsolete adverbial spelling. We would be interested in any reference to a published example of this type.