Numismatic Collection of the Museum of History of Azerbaijan in Baku, Azerbaijan

The Numismatics Fund of the National Museum of History of Azerbaijan preserves and studies more than 100,000 coins from different historical periods. Based in the museum’s Baku building, the collection brings together coinage connected with Azerbaijan as well as currencies issued by states and empires whose money circulated across the Caucasus and neighboring regions.

What the Numismatics Fund Contains

The holdings include ancient and oriental coins, with material from ancient Greek cities, the Roman and Byzantine empires, and Hellenistic states such as the Seleucid and Parthian kingdoms. The collection also preserves coinage associated with the long monetary history of the South Caucasus and the states that ruled or traded in the region.

Coins connected with locally important dynasties form an especially useful part of the fund. The museum’s published collection records include issues of the Sajids, Eldiguzids, Shirvanshahs and Safavids, among others. Such objects document changing rulers, mints, denominations, inscriptions, metals and monetary systems through physical evidence rather than written records alone.

One object highlighted by the museum is a gold dinar of the Sajid state, minted in 293 AH, corresponding to 912–913 CE. Another published object is a copper dirham associated with Shamseddin Eldeniz. The museum has also used material from the fund for research and publications devoted to Safavid coinage.

How the Collection Developed

The Numismatics Fund dates to 1920, the year the museum itself was established. Its earliest collection consisted of only 103 coins. Museum records show rapid growth during the following decades: the holdings reached 4,734 coins in 1928 and 16,728 by 1939.

Numismatist Yevgeny Pakhomov played a central role in forming and studying the early collection. His work involved researching coin finds from Azerbaijan and documenting hoards and individual discoveries. This helped turn material entering the museum into evidence that could be compared by mint, chronology, ruler and find location.

The collection continued to expand through archaeological finds, transferred hoards, purchases and donations. Coin discoveries from different parts of Azerbaijan have repeatedly entered the museum’s holdings, allowing researchers to study how particular currencies moved through towns, trade routes and political territories.

Coin Hoards and Archaeological Finds

Hoards are an important part of the fund because groups of coins found together can provide chronological and monetary evidence that isolated specimens cannot always supply. Museum records include medieval silver coin hoards and later groups of coins recovered in regions including Shamakhi, Zagatala and Ganja.

A hoard transferred from the Zagatala region, for example, included silver dirhams attributed to the Shirvanshahs Muhammad V and Yazid III. The same acquisition included a silver dirham issued in the name of Shirvanshah Gubad. Other documented material includes silver coins from the Ilkhanid and Aq Qoyunlu periods found in the Ganja region.

The value of these finds extends beyond identifying individual rulers. The place where a coin was discovered, its relationship to other coins in the same deposit and its minting period can help researchers reconstruct patterns of circulation and economic contact.

Numismatics as a Research Collection

The fund is not simply an accumulation of collectible coins. The National Museum of History of Azerbaijan uses its numismatic material for research, cataloguing and scholarly publication. Museum publications have examined subjects including Azerbaijan’s coinage traditions, Shirvanshah issues, Safavid coinage and collections of gold coins from Muslim states.

Inscriptions are particularly useful for identifying rulers, mints and dates. Changes in metal, weight and design can also reveal shifts in monetary practice. When coins are connected to documented archaeological contexts or hoards, they can assist in dating other material found with them.

Seeing Numismatic Material in Baku

The Numismatics Fund belongs to the National Museum of History of Azerbaijan rather than operating as a separate museum. Visitor information is therefore provided through the main museum, which is located at 4 H. Z. Taghiyev Street in central Baku.

The museum’s official visitor page lists exhibition hours as 10:00 to 17:00 and states that the museum is closed on Mondays. Numismatic objects form part of the museum’s wider historical holdings, while the complete research collection is much larger than the selection that can be presented in exhibition spaces at one time.