Six Worn Tribal Silver Coin necklace. All the millions of the many “tribes” of India always appreciated the value and the worth of the Silver Rupee coinage of the British East India Company, minted in high Silver content from the mid 1700s, especially when in 1835 a properly regulated mint producing British-designed Silver coinage was built in Calcutta, and the coinage became uniform throughout the land.
The Silver coin system had four denominations: Rupee, Half Rupee, Quarter Rupee and Two Anna, the Two Anna coin being 1/8th of a Rupee.
In above necklace of Six Worn Tribal coins, all six are Two Annas, dating from the year 1862 to the year 1897, in the reign of Queen Victoria, Empress of India. Victoria is designated “Empress” on the coin front.
The entire Silver coinage range was high Silver content, 91.6% Silver content, always of the same purity, from the Rupee to the Two Annas, each calibrated to the exact same minted weight and no matter from which mint, Bombay, Hyderabad or Calcutta. Wherever in India the Silver coins of the British Raj were worked into jewellery, the exact worth of each coin was a complete known, easy to trade anywhere in the subcontinent and anywhere in its environs.