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Umm Hajara silver hoard

Objects Time

كنز أم حجرة الفضي

A hoard of 409 Sasanian, Arab-Sasanian, Umayyad and Abbasid silver dirhams found near the village of Umm Hajara north of al-Hasaka and handed to Syria's Directorate-General of Antiquities and Museums on 11 May 1970 1.

Depth

At a glance

Region
Levant & Iraq

Trade and finance

Summary

The Umm Hajara hoard is a hoard of silver dirhams that the political security branch of al-Hasaka province handed to Syria's Directorate-General of Antiquities and Museums on 11 May 1970. 1 It was found 150 metres west of the small mound on which the village of Umm Hajara stands, amid fields, about forty kilometres north of al-Hasaka on the road to Qamishli, and it is kept in the National Museum of Damascus. 2 1

Contents

It consists of 409 dirhams, in chronological order: 1

  • 155 Sasanian dirhams, the earliest of Peroz (459–484) and the latest of Hormizd V (631–632), from many mints. 1 3
  • 54 Arab-Sasanian dirhams, the group that drew the author to study the hoard for its rare and unique pieces, including dirhams of Abd al-Malik ibn Marwan, Abd Allah ibn al-Zubayr, Qatari ibn al-Fuja'a and Ziyad ibn Abi Sufyan. 1 4 5 6
  • 17 Umayyad dirhams. 1
  • Two rebel dirhams of the Umayyad period, one struck at Kufa in 128 AH with "no judgement but God's", when al-Dahhak ibn Qays al-Shaybani held the city. 1 7
  • One Andalusian Umayyad dirham of Abd al-Rahman I struck in al-Andalus in 170 AH, marked by a crescent below the central legend. 1 8
  • 179 Abbasid dirhams dated 134–193 AH. 1 9
  • A Seljuk dirham of Mas'ud II ibn Kaykawus struck at Bayburt in 689 or 690 AH, which the author is certain does not belong to the hoard and was picked up with it by the workmen. 10

Connections

Explore the connections

Related to
Arab-Byzantine and Arab-Sasanian coinage
Subject of
The Umm Hajara Silver Hoard (al-Ush)

People and things also explored

Arab-Byzantine and Arab-Sasanian coinage· The Umm Hajara Silver Hoard (al-Ush)· Coinage of Islamic Khwarazm (8th–13th century)· Muhammad Abu al-Faraj al-Ush· Catalogue des monnaies musulmanes: Khalifes orientaux (Lavoix)· Qatari ibn al-Fuja'a· Al-Madina Souq, Aleppo· Bazaar of Tabriz

Sources

  1. Muhammad Abu al-Faraj al-Ush, Kanz Umm Hajara al-fiddi [The Umm Hajara silver hoard: Sasanian, Arab-Sasanian, Umayyad, Abbasid, in the National Museum, Damascus], 1st ed., Damascus: Directorate-General of Antiquities and Museums, 1972 , p. 5
  2. Muhammad Abu al-Faraj al-Ush, Kanz Umm Hajara al-fiddi [The Umm Hajara silver hoard: Sasanian, Arab-Sasanian, Umayyad, Abbasid, in the National Museum, Damascus], 1st ed., Damascus: Directorate-General of Antiquities and Museums, 1972 , p. 1
  3. Muhammad Abu al-Faraj al-Ush, Kanz Umm Hajara al-fiddi [The Umm Hajara silver hoard: Sasanian, Arab-Sasanian, Umayyad, Abbasid, in the National Museum, Damascus], 1st ed., Damascus: Directorate-General of Antiquities and Museums, 1972 , p. 6
  4. Muhammad Abu al-Faraj al-Ush, Kanz Umm Hajara al-fiddi [The Umm Hajara silver hoard: Sasanian, Arab-Sasanian, Umayyad, Abbasid, in the National Museum, Damascus], 1st ed., Damascus: Directorate-General of Antiquities and Museums, 1972 , p. 27
  5. Muhammad Abu al-Faraj al-Ush, Kanz Umm Hajara al-fiddi [The Umm Hajara silver hoard: Sasanian, Arab-Sasanian, Umayyad, Abbasid, in the National Museum, Damascus], 1st ed., Damascus: Directorate-General of Antiquities and Museums, 1972 , p. 29
  6. Muhammad Abu al-Faraj al-Ush, Kanz Umm Hajara al-fiddi [The Umm Hajara silver hoard: Sasanian, Arab-Sasanian, Umayyad, Abbasid, in the National Museum, Damascus], 1st ed., Damascus: Directorate-General of Antiquities and Museums, 1972 , p. 30
  7. Muhammad Abu al-Faraj al-Ush, Kanz Umm Hajara al-fiddi [The Umm Hajara silver hoard: Sasanian, Arab-Sasanian, Umayyad, Abbasid, in the National Museum, Damascus], 1st ed., Damascus: Directorate-General of Antiquities and Museums, 1972 , p. 52
  8. Muhammad Abu al-Faraj al-Ush, Kanz Umm Hajara al-fiddi [The Umm Hajara silver hoard: Sasanian, Arab-Sasanian, Umayyad, Abbasid, in the National Museum, Damascus], 1st ed., Damascus: Directorate-General of Antiquities and Museums, 1972 , p. 54
  9. Muhammad Abu al-Faraj al-Ush, Kanz Umm Hajara al-fiddi [The Umm Hajara silver hoard: Sasanian, Arab-Sasanian, Umayyad, Abbasid, in the National Museum, Damascus], 1st ed., Damascus: Directorate-General of Antiquities and Museums, 1972 , p. 55
  10. Muhammad Abu al-Faraj al-Ush, Kanz Umm Hajara al-fiddi [The Umm Hajara silver hoard: Sasanian, Arab-Sasanian, Umayyad, Abbasid, in the National Museum, Damascus], 1st ed., Damascus: Directorate-General of Antiquities and Museums, 1972 , p. 108
Cite this page

islam.museum contributors. “Umm Hajara silver hoard”. islam.museum, https://islam.museum/en/object/umm-hajara-hoard/. CC BY-SA 4.0. Last updated 2026-11-04.

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Manuscripts, art, architecture and relics from collections worldwide. Related

Arab-Byzantine and Arab-Sasanian coinage

The coins struck in early Islam on Byzantine and Sasanian models with added Arabic phrases, from Umar ibn al-Khattab to Abd al-Malik's Arabisation of 77–78 AH, as Farajallah Ahmad Yusuf describes them.