Browse the full archive grouped by dynasty. Click any image to zoom in, or use the search and filters to find a coin by ruler, mint, metal or date.
King Alyattes
c. 610–560 BCE
Earliest coins to reach Persian markets; the prototype Achaemenid coinage would later replace.
c. 800–600 BCE
Pre-monetary silver weighed against grain standards; recovered from Nush-i Jan and Tepe Hasanlu hoards.
King Croesus (Kroisos)
c. 561–546 BCE
Croesus, last king of Lydia, replaced the older electrum coinage with the world's first true bimetallic system in pure gold and pure silver — a model the Achaemenid daric/siglos would inherit a generation later.
Darius I to Darius III
c. 485–330 BCE
The Greeks called them 'archers' — Agesilaus famously said he was 'driven out of Asia by 10,000 archers'.
Xerxes I – Artaxerxes II
c. 485–375 BCE
20 Sigloi = 1 Daric. Hundreds of thousands survive — the most common Achaemenid coin.
Achaemenid satrap (probably Tiribazos)
Early 4th century BCE
Among the earliest realistic portraits in Western coinage.
Darius III / Alexander era
c. 336–300 BCE
Continuation of Persian types under Macedonian rule for paying mercenaries.
Mazaios, Satrap of Babylon
c. 331–328 BCE
Struck by Mazaios, the Achaemenid satrap who surrendered Babylon to Alexander in 331 BCE and was confirmed as governor. His coinage is a hinge moment: Achaemenid satrapal iconography continued unchanged into the early Macedonian administration.
Antiochos I Soter (Seleucid)
281–261 BCE
Anchor symbol referenced the Seleucid dynasty's founding legend.
Antiochus III
222–187 BCE
Struck in massive quantities to fund eastern campaigns.
Diodotus I (Greco-Bactrian)
c. 250 BCE
Diodotus broke from the Seleucids to found the Greco-Bactrian kingdom — Hellenistic coinage striking deep into eastern Iran.
Antiochus IV Epiphanes
175–164 BCE
The most ambitious Seleucid king after Antiochus III — his eastern campaigns took him deep into Iran where he died in 164 BCE near Tabae in Persis. His coinage is the high-water mark of Seleucid royal portraiture.
Mithradates I
171–138 BCE
First king to title himself 'Great King'.
Mithradates II
121–91 BCE
Coinage shifts from Greek to Iranian royal imagery.
Orodes I
90–77 BCE
Orodes I ruled in a turbulent period of Arsacid civil war. His successor Orodes II would later defeat Crassus at Carrhae (53 BCE).
Vologases VI
208–228 CE
Vologases VI was the last Arsacid king; he was overthrown by Ardashir I, who founded the Sasanian Empire.
Phraates IV
37–2 BCE
Phraates IV defeated Mark Antony's Parthian expedition (36 BCE) and later received the four Roman legionary standards lost at Carrhae back from Augustus (20 BCE) — a diplomatic coup commemorated on Roman coinage. His Seleucia tetradrachms are precisely dated month-by-month.
Vologases I
51–78 CE
Vologases I founded a new dynastic branch and is credited by Pahlavi tradition with the first systematic collection of the Avesta. His reign coincided with Rome's wars over Armenia and the Treaty of Rhandeia (63 CE).
Artabanus IV (last Arsacid)
c. 213–224 CE
Killed by Ardashir I at the Battle of Hormozdgan in 224 CE — the end of the Arsacid dynasty after nearly five centuries and the dawn of the Sasanian empire.
Darius II of Persis (Darayan)
1st century BCE – 1st century CE
The semi-autonomous Frataraka and later kings of Persis ruled the Achaemenid homeland under Seleucid then Parthian overlordship. Their coins preserve Persian religious iconography (fire altar, royal figure) that the Sasanians would revive and standardise.
Kamnaskires V of Elymais
c. 54–32 BCE
The Kingdom of Elymais — successor to ancient Elam in lowland Khuzestan — minted vassal coinage under Parthian overlordship. Their stylised portraits are some of the most distinctive of the period.
Ardashir I (founder)
224–242 CE
Founder of the dynasty after defeating Artabanus IV.
Shapur I
240–272 CE
Defeated three Roman emperors including Valerian (captured 260 CE).
Khosrow I
531–579 CE
Currency reformer; standardised drachm weight and purity. Massive output.
Khosrow II
590–628 CE
Most common Sasanian coin; struck in huge quantities through 38-year reign.
Bahram V (Bahram Gur)
420–438 CE
Hero of Persian epic — celebrated in Ferdowsi's Shahnameh and Nezami's 'Haft Peykar'. Gold dinars are rare; eastern mints (Sind) supplied trade with India.
Peroz I
459–484 CE
Peroz's wars against the Hephthalites bankrupted the empire and he was killed in battle in 484. From his reign onward, mint and year on Sasanian drachms enable precise dating.
Kavad I
488–531 CE (two reigns)
Kavad's reforms paved the way for Khosrow I. His support for the radical Mazdakite movement marks one of the most dramatic episodes in late antique Iran.
Yazdegerd III (last Sasanian)
632–651 CE
Killed at Merv. His coins continued posthumously into the Arab-Sasanian series.
c. 260–272 CE
Sasanian gold dinars were comparatively rare, used for diplomatic gifts and high-value trade with Rome and India. Shapur I's gold issues celebrate his triumphs over three Roman emperors — most famously the capture of Valerian in 260 CE.
Bahram II
276–293 CE
Bahram II's coins are exceptional in Sasanian numismatics for showing the royal family together — a propaganda response to the religious challenge of Manichaeism, brutally suppressed under his predecessor Bahram I.
Shapur III
383–388 CE
Shapur III concluded the long partition of Armenia with Rome (387 CE), dividing it into Persian and Roman spheres. His gold issues are far rarer than the silver and were probably commemorative or diplomatic.
Bahram Chobin (usurper)
590–591 CE
A Sasanian general from the Mihran clan who briefly seized the throne from Khosrow II — the only non-Sasanian to rule Iran between Ardashir I and the Arab conquest. Khosrow II recovered the throne with Byzantine help; Bahram Chobin's coins were struck for barely a year.
Ubayd Allah ibn Ziyad
673–683 CE
Transitional issue — Sasanian iconography continued for 50 years after the conquest.
Abd al-Malik (post-reform)
77 AH / 696 CE
First purely epigraphic Islamic coin — a revolution in monetary art.
Abd al-Malik I (Samanid)
955–956 CE
Samanid silver dirhams flooded Viking-age trade; vast hoards found from Russia to Sweden.
Mas'ud III (Ghaznavid)
1099–1115 CE
Ghaznavid Indian campaigns funded vast gold issues from Mahmud onward.
Malik-Shah I
1072–1092 CE
Issued across a vast empire from Anatolia to Transoxiana.
Citing Ghazan Khan as overlord
1296–1304 CE
Reformed coinage after Ghazan's conversion; bilingual issues.
Tahir ibn Husayn
821–822 CE (AH 206)
Tahir founded the first quasi-independent Iranian Islamic dynasty in Khorasan (821–873), nominally loyal to the Abbasid caliph.
Ya'qub ibn al-Layth al-Saffar
861–879 CE
The 'Coppersmith' rose from a militia leader in Sistan to ruling Iran from Fars to Khorasan — founder of the Saffarid dynasty and a hero of Iranian self-rule against the Abbasids.
'Adud al-Dawla (Buyid)
AH 372 (982–983 CE)
The Buyids (934–1062) controlled the caliph in Baghdad while openly using Persian royal titulature on their coinage — a deliberate Iranian revival.
Arghun Khan (Ilkhanid)
AH 684 / 1285–1286 CE
Bilingual Arabic-Uighur issue from the Mongol Ilkhanate of Iran, before Ghazan's conversion to Islam.
Caliph Harun al-Rashid
AH 184 / 800 CE
Struck at the height of the Abbasid Caliphate's prestige under the patron of the 'Thousand and One Nights' court. Abbasid gold dinars circulated as the dominant trade coin from al-Andalus to Sogdia, and the standard was rigorously maintained for over two centuries.
Issued under Caliph al-Mahdi
AH 158–169 / 775–785 CE
Long after the Arab conquest the Caspian province of Tabaristan retained semi-autonomous local dynasties (Dabuyids, then Abbasid governors) who continued striking Sasanian-style half-drachms with Pahlavi script — among the latest survivals of pre-Islamic Iranian coinage, well into the late 8th century.
Mu'izz al-Din Muhammad of Ghor
AH 599–602 / 1202–1206 CE
Mu'izz al-Din (also Muhammad of Ghor) extended Ghurid rule from Afghanistan into northern India, founding the Delhi Sultanate's precursor state. His coinage circulated from Herat to the Gangetic plain.
'Ala' al-Din Muhammad II
1200–1220 CE
Muhammad II ruled one of the largest empires of the Islamic Middle Ages — from the Caspian to the Indus — but his execution of Mongol envoys provoked Genghis Khan's catastrophic invasion of 1219–1221, ending the Khwarazmian state and beginning the Mongol era in Iran.
Timur (Tamerlane)
AH 795 / 1393 CE
Struck in Timur's name while nominally honouring the Chagatai khan — the silver tanka standard he established was inherited by his successors and later the Safavids.
Ulugh Beg
AH 850–853 / 1447–1449 CE
Ulugh Beg — astronomer-king and grandson of Timur — issued tankas continuing the high silver standard of his father Shah Rukh's shahrukhi.
Shah Suleiman I
AH 1101 / 1690 CE
Heavy ceremonial multiple of the shahi denomination, struck at the Safavid capital. Continues the Shia-doctrinal coinage type first standardised by Shah Ismail I in 1501.
Shah Suleiman I (Safavid)
1666–1694 CE
The denomination 'abbasi' was named after Shah Abbas I (1588–1629) and remained the standard Safavid silver trade coin across the Persian Gulf for over a century.
Sultan Husayn
1694–1722 CE
Last great Safavid issues before the Afghan siege of Isfahan (1722).
Baysunghur (Aq Qoyunlu)
1490–1493 CE
The Aq Qoyunlu ('White Sheep' Turkmen) ruled western Iran from Tabriz before being overthrown by Shah Ismail I and the Safavids in 1501.
Shah Ismail I (founder)
1501–1524 CE
First coinage of the Safavid empire from its founding capital. Shah Ismail's elevation of Twelver Shi'ism to state religion in 1501 was an act of historic religious transformation, and his coins are its first physical declaration.
Shah Tahmasp I
1524–1576 CE
Tahmasp's 52-year reign stabilised the dynasty after his father's defeat at Chaldiran (1514). His Mashhad coinage, struck at the Shrine of Imam Reza, was a powerful Shia statement directed at the Sunni Ottoman and Uzbek neighbours.
Shah Abbas I
1588–1629 CE
Shah Abbas built modern Iran — a centralised administration, the relocated capital at Isfahan, and a silk monopoly that drew European trading companies. The 'abbasi' silver coin (~7.7 g) bearing his name became the gold standard of Indian Ocean trade for two centuries.
Nader Shah Afshar
1738–9 CE (AH 1151)
Bilingual issues struck after the conquest of Delhi in 1739.
AH 1148–1160 / 1736–1747 CE
Struck at the former Safavid capital after Nader took the throne in 1736. Heavy issues from melted Mughal treasure circulated alongside his Indian-mint rupees.
Karim Khan Zand
1751–1779 CE
Among the most beautifully calligraphed Persian coins.
Fath-Ali Shah Qajar
1797–1834 CE
Heavy gold toman — first figural Iranian coin types in 1100 years on related issues.
Early 19th century
Struck at the Ganja mint in the contested Caucasus frontier — the city was ceded to the Russian Empire under the 1813 Treaty of Gulistan, ending Qajar minting there. 1 toman = 10 qiran = 1000 dinars.
Muzaffar al-Din Shah era
c. 1896 CE
Among the largest Qajar gold denominations. Muzaffar al-Din signed the Constitution in 1906.
Mohammad Ali Shah Qajar
1907–1909 CE
Mohammad Ali Shah's brief reign was dominated by his attempt to abolish the Constitution; he was deposed in 1909 and went into Russian exile.
Ahmad Shah Qajar
1909–1925 CE
Last Qajar ruler — crowned aged 11, deposed by Reza Khan in 1925. His machine-struck Tehran-mint coinage carries solar Hijri (SH) dates.
1906
Iran's first true paper currency: the British-chartered Imperial Bank issued notes from 1890 with each branch (Tehran, Tabriz, Isfahan, Bushehr, Yazd, Mashhad, Resht, Shiraz, Kermanshah) issuing non-fungible notes payable only at its own counter.
Naser al-Din Shah Qajar
c. 1890
The smallest denomination of the earliest Iranian banknote series.
c. 1890–1923
Mid-range Imperial Bank note; a Tehran-payable 10 toman would not be accepted in Tabriz.
High-denomination Imperial Bank note — equivalent to a modest annual salary at issue.
Naser al-Din / late Qajar
A surviving example illustrating the branch-bound nature of early Iranian paper money.
Mozaffar al-Din Shah Qajar
1896–1907 CE
Mozaffar al-Din Shah signed the 1906 Constitution that established Iran's first parliament (Majles), making him the last absolute Qajar monarch. His machine-struck Tehran coinage in qirans and tomans set the standard for late-Qajar circulation.
Reza Shah Pahlavi
SH 1305–1320 (1926–1941)
Successor bullion coin to the toman. Still traded today as Iran's gold investment standard.
Mohammad Reza Shah
SH 1355 / 1976
Minted in 1/4, 1/2, 1, 2½, 5 and 10 pahlavi denominations.
SH 1350 / 1971
Issued for Persepolis ceremonies celebrating 2500 years of Persian monarchy.
SH 1357 / 1978
Late-Pahlavi commemorative — part of the broader commemorative-coin output that includes the FAO 'Money Coin' series.
Reza Shah
SH 1317 / 1938
First series of Bank Melli notes featuring the new shah.
1969–1971
Workhorse high-denomination note from the late 1960s oil-boom era, issued by the newly-founded Central Bank of Iran (Bank Markazi).
High denomination of the first Bank Melli series under Reza Shah — equivalent to a substantial sum in the 1930s.
Highest denomination of the Reza Shah series; rare in collectible grade.
SH 2535 / 1976
From the late-Pahlavi 'imperial calendar' (Shahanshahi) series — controversially replaced the Islamic calendar in 1976.
1977
Mid-high denomination of the final Bank Markazi Pahlavi series before the 1979 revolution.
1978
Highest denomination of the final Pahlavi series — printed on the eve of the 1979 revolution; many were later overprinted with arabesques to cover the Shah's portrait.
Special commemorative note for the half-centennial of the dynasty founded by Reza Shah in 1925.
1980s
Representative of early-Republic circulation coinage.
Transitional issue, Islamic Republic
1979–1981
Following the 1979 revolution, existing stocks of high-denomination Pahlavi notes were over-printed to remove the Shah's image while replacement notes were designed.
1985 onwards
The 100 rial note became the workhorse low denomination of the post-revolutionary era; later supplanted by the coin.
1981–1982
Second IR series, with revolutionary imagery replacing royal portraits.
1981
Second-series IR high denomination; replaced the over-printed Pahlavi notes.
Highest denomination of the second IR series, issued before the 1992 Khomeini-portrait redesign.
1992 – present
Workhorse banknote of the modern era, reissued repeatedly with security upgrades.