1660 - 1691 - Dutch Ceilon
Colombo CounterMark - Surat Rupee

SPECIFICATIONS Denomination Rupee Alloy Silver Type Struck Diameter 22/22.5 mm Thickness _._ mm Weight legal 11.444 gms Weight 11.52 gms Shape Round Edge Smooth DieAxis _____° Mint Surat,India CounterMark Colombo
	Codrington unlisted ; Scholten unlisted

Obverse : Aurangzeb Alamgir Surat rupee 1073 with reginal year 5.
Reverse : Countermark VOC/C (Colombo) to right of center tilted left-down.

By the placard of 1660 October 23rd, No silver or copper coins, were allowed in circulate after 1660 November 8th except those marked by the Company. Accordingly all foreign coins like this Indian Silver Rupee above were countermarked to allow them to circulate on the Island. The Surat rupee was one of the trade coins adopted by the Dutch and the Countermark might had ceased long before the Abbasis were taken out of circulation in 1691.

Very few of these Countermarked Surat have been recorded. It is not mentioned in Codrington, Grogan, Scholten or Mitchiner.

Text from
* Ceylon Coins and Currency By H. W. Codrington. Colombo 1924
  Chapter VIII Portuguese - Plate xxx. Page xxx
* The Coins of the Dutch Overseas Territories- 1601-1948
  C. Scholten, 1953, Amsterdam: Jacques Schulman. page xxx-xxx
* Moedas Portuguesas 1128-1988, by Alberto Gomes. Lisbon 1987
* Collection Henry Thomas Grogan, J. Schulman, Auction 23-02-1914.
* Non-Islamic and Western Colonies since 600 AD by by Michael Mitchiner.

I thank Jan Lingen who kindly sent me the 300 dpi scans of these rare coin from his collection and are displayed at xxx dpi.