Fanams are so small in size that most people are amazed that such coins were ever introduced. It is difficult to manage them, and it is more easy to lose them than hold on to them. Pictures: Travancore Silver fanams, shown above a cenitmeter scale and below and Indian one rupee (modern) coin to give an idea of how small they were
Several reasons have been suggested for the small size, and perhaps all of them are right. One is the importance of gold in the Indian society. Giving gold to friends, relatives, and to the priests were practices embedded into the Indian fiber. However, this would be an impossible task for most people in society, seeing gold was always costly. It has been proposed that tiny coins made of gold would fulfill such a need in an ideal manner.
It is precisely because of this reason that the Mugal emperors like Aurangzeb, Farrkuhsiyar, Mohammad Shah, and Alamgir II issued half-fanams for use in Chiefly in their southern Kingdoms. These were issued from their southern mints at Gutti, Thadipatri, and Cuddppah.
There seems to be some merit in this proposal because even today such a practice exists in a couple of states in India where gold is an essential part of life. For example, in many places in UP, placing gold ornaments on the dead body is essential before a woman’s body is cremated. Thus they sell extremely light gold ornaments in these places which helps the rich and poor to fulfill the religious practice without spending a fortune.
Similarly, in Kerala (a state mad after gold), one-gram gold ornaments are common. People present these to relatives for marriage and other religious occasions. The small weight ensures that they do not burden the purchaser. Finally the family that get all these ornaments takes it to the goldsmith which melts them and makes a heavy ornament (or two), or exchanges them with heavier ornaments.
It has also been reported that in some places in Tamilnadu there was a practice of offering very tiny gold coins to the bride at the time of her marriage. These were then placed in the mouth of the dead body before cremation. Known as Pudu Panams (new money, probably an allusion to money given when she enters a newly wedded life) these were very small coins. In all probability these were gold fanams. Some people in Tamil Nadu are reported to practice this even today, but they no longer use gold coins or fanams for it.
There is always a possibility that some of the gold fanams seen today were minted specifically for such religious purposes, and that they were not “currency” in the real sense of that word. Only further investigation would help distinguish between the fanams that were minted for use as currency and the “fanams” that were manufactured (rightly) for this kind of religious practices.
