The Coinage of the Ayyubids. By Paul Balog, 

Hard Bound with flap cover, 334 Pages and 50 Plates. 

The Coinage of Saladin and his successors in the Fertile Crescent and Arabia is among the most complex and interesting of the medieval Islamic world.It comprises gold dinars developed from the Fatimid model, Silver dirhams of various patterns and standards, and coppers certian of which show human and animal figures like those of contemporary Turkoman states. The author brings together material from the major public and private collections of the world in a comprehensive catalogue of this coinage. He also studies the historical and economic background to the issues: their metrology and fineness: the mint network: and the way in which the types reflect the ebb and flow of relations between the nominal head of the ayyubids state in Egypt, his relativess ruling the numerous principalities of syria, Mesoptamia and the Yemen, and outside powers such as the Seljuqs of Rum.