The Palembang pitis (also spelled pitjis) was a currency issued by the

Palembang Sultanate The Sultanate of Palembang Darussalam ( Malay: كسلطانن ڤلمبڠ دارالسلام) was a sultanate in Indonesia whose capital was the city of Palembang in the southern part of the Indonesian island of Sumatra. It was proclaimed in 1659 ...

from the 1600s until 1825 when the sultanate was dissolved and its territory taken over by the colonial government of the

Dutch East Indies The Dutch East Indies, also known as the Netherlands East Indies (; ), was a Dutch Empire, Dutch colony with territory mostly comprising the modern state of Indonesia, which Proclamation of Indonesian Independence, declared independence on 17 Au ...

. The currency consisted of low denomination

tin Tin is a chemical element; it has symbol Sn () and atomic number 50. A silvery-colored metal, tin is soft enough to be cut with little force, and a bar of tin can be bent by hand with little effort. When bent, a bar of tin makes a sound, the ...

alloy coins which were mostly traded in bulk. Due to the lack of a centralized mint, the pitis often had inconsistent manufacture and were frequently counterfeited.

History

Palembang, like

Banten Banten (, , Pegon alphabet, Pegon: بنتن) is the westernmost Provinces of Indonesia, province on the island of Java, Indonesia. Its capital city is Serang and its largest city is Tangerang. The province borders West Java and the Special Capi ...

, had become an independent sultanate when

Demak Sultanate The Demak Sultanate () was a Javanese Muslim state located on Java's north coast in Indonesia, at the site of the present-day city of Demak. A port fief to the Hindu-Buddhist Majapahit kingdom thought to have been founded in the last quarter o ...

declined following the death of Sultan Trenggana in 1546. Thereafter from the 1560s to 1620s, Palembang became an active trade participant in two key products of the region,

pepper Pepper(s) may refer to: Food and spice * Piperaceae or the pepper family, a large family of flowering plants ** Black pepper ** Long pepper ** Kampot pepper * ''Capsicum'' or pepper, a genus of flowering plants in the nightshade family Solanacea ...

and

. During the course of this trade, coins from various local sultanates circulated in Palembang, namely Banten, Siak, Kampar and

Jambi Jambi is a province of Indonesia. It is located on the east coast of central Sumatra Sumatra () is one of the Sunda Islands of western Indonesia. It is the largest island that is fully within Indonesian territory, as well as the list of i ...

, in addition to

Chinese cash coins The cash or ''qian'' was a type of coin of China and the East Asian cultural sphere, Sinosphere, used from the 4th century BCE until the 20th century, characterised by their round outer shape and a square center hole ( zh, c=方穿, poj=hong-chh ...

which had already been circulating in the archipelago. Palembang's earliest coinage date from this period, which were tin imitation of Chinese cash with

Chinese characters Chinese characters are logographs used Written Chinese, to write the Chinese languages and others from regions historically influenced by Chinese culture. Of the four independently invented writing systems accepted by scholars, they represe ...

phonetically rendering " pangeran" or "sultan" into ''panglân'' (邦闌) and ''sútan'' (史丹) respectively, dated between 1600 and 1658. This was followed by an issue with Arabic Jawi inscription reading alamat sulṭan'' (علامت سلطان), dated between 1658 and 1710. The second half of the 17th century saw increasing monopoly of Dutch East Indies Company (VOC) in the pepper and tin trade. This severely undermined the regional trading network and undermined the prosperity of local sultanates. Local coins became scarce in Palembang, with the exception of coins minted at Palembang itself. Beside the pitis, the early 1700s also saw the release of VOC duiten and

Spanish dollar The Spanish dollar, also known as the piece of eight (, , , or ), is a silver coin of approximately diameter worth eight Spanish reales. It was minted in the Spanish Empire following a monetary reform in 1497 with content fine silver. It w ...

, which also circulated in Palembang. Around 1710, tin deposits were discovered on

Bangka Island Bangka is an island lying east of Sumatra, Indonesia. It is administered under the province of the Bangka Belitung Islands, being one of its namesakes alongside the smaller island of Belitung across the Gaspar Strait. The 9th largest island in ...

, which was part of Palembang Sultanate at the time. The discovery led to a tin surplus which was traded in form of ingots by the sultanate and provided materials for low denomination coinage in mass quantity. The eighteenth century coinage of Palembang Sultanate consisted of two separate coin series. The first is the sultan's small-size coins bearing Jawi inscriptions, and the second is larger-size coins bearing Chinese inscription. The Chinese style coins, which were minted for the Chinese mining communities on Bangka are commonly thought to only circulate in Bangka. However, Bangka at the time had close ties with the administration of Palembang City and Chinese style coins appear to have also been minted in the city as well. It is very likely that the Chinese style coins circulated side by side with the sultan's coins within the core areas of Palembang. In 1812, Palembang lost its source of tin when British forces occupied Bangka Island. The island went on to become a nominal Dutch possession after the Anglo-Dutch Treaty of 1814 and was formally handed over to the Dutch in 1816. Around 1820s,

Sultan Mahmud Badaruddin II Sultan Mahmud Badaruddin II (1767–1852) was the 8th Sultan of the Palembang Sultanate from 1804–1821. His parents were Sultan Muhammad Bahauddin and Ratu Agung Al-Haddad. He is now regarded as a National Hero of Indonesia National Hero ...

rose up against the Dutch and was defeated by the Dutch general

Hendrik Merkus de Kock Hendrik Merkus, Baron de Kock (25 May 1779 – 12 April 1845) was a Dutch military officer, colonial administrator and politician who served as lieutenant governor-general of the Dutch East Indies from 1826 to 1830. He also served as Minister ...

in 1821. The Dutch divested Mahmud of his powers and exiled him to Ternate in the same year. In 1825, the Dutch took Palembang under direct Dutch administration. The last dated Palembang pitis was from 1804, and presumably further production ceased by 1825.

Manufacture

Palembang's output of coins had been fairly restrained before 1710, but tin surplus expanded the state's coinage. Pitis were

cast Cast may refer to: Music * Cast (band), an English alternative rock band * Cast (Mexican band), a progressive Mexican rock band * The Cast, a Scottish musical duo: Mairi Campbell and Dave Francis * ''Cast'', a 2012 album by Trespassers William ...

in the same way as

: molten tin was first cast into molds which resulted in "coin trees." Individual coins were then broken off and polished to round the edges, although stem remnants from unthorough polishing are commonly seen in Palembang pitis. Finally, a die is used to struck the coin with the appropriate inscription. Official coinage issued by the Sultan formed only one part of the total coinage circulating in Palembang, as the manufacture of counterfeit coinage became a major industry. Counterfeit coins could have been made by almost anyone with access to Palembang's tin supply during the period of tin surplus. There are reports of severe punishment against counterfeiters, but as the quality of official pitis themselves were often inconsistent due to lack of centralized manufacture, it may be difficult to ascertain whether a particular sample is official or unauthorized issue. Common inconsistencies include size, weight, and inscriptions (which were especially prone of deformation in early types).

Types

All currency of Palembang pitis consisted of coins made from

lead Lead () is a chemical element; it has Chemical symbol, symbol Pb (from Latin ) and atomic number 82. It is a Heavy metal (elements), heavy metal that is density, denser than most common materials. Lead is Mohs scale, soft and Ductility, malleabl ...

alloy, except for a single

copper Copper is a chemical element; it has symbol Cu (from Latin ) and atomic number 29. It is a soft, malleable, and ductile metal with very high thermal and electrical conductivity. A freshly exposed surface of pure copper has a pinkish-orang ...

issue. Each type contain inscription on the obverse with blank reverse. Most contain the Arabic phrase في بلد ڤلمبڠ ''fi bilad Palembang'' ("in the land of Palembang") rendered in Jawi script, and some included year of mintage using

Hijri era Hijra, Hijrah, Hegira, Hejira, Hijrat or Hijri may refer to: Islam * Hijrah (also ''Hejira'' or ''Hegira''), the migration of Muhammad from Mecca to Medina in 622 CE * Migration to Abyssinia or First Hegira, of Muhammad's followers in 615 CE * L ...

or ''Anno Hegirae'' (AH). Coins could be divided into two categories: coins without a hole called pitis buntu and coins with a hole called pitis teboh, which included Chinese cash imitations. Disregarding variants, some of the known types produced by the official Palembang mint are as following:

Pitis Buntu

Pitis Teboh

Exchange Rate

Palembang pitis served as low denomination currency valued and exchanged in bulks with the VOC duiten and

. ''Buntu'' and ''teboh'' were worth the same and they only differed in their group units. Pitis ''buntu'' were grouped into parcels wrapped in leaves. A parcel with 250 pieces is known as a ''kupat'' (كوفات) which has the value of one ''kejer'' equivalent to 20 duiten and dollar. Pitis ''teboh'' were grouped into strings with a piece of

rattan Rattan, also spelled ratan (from Malay language, Malay: ''rotan''), is the name for roughly 600 species of Old World climbing palms belonging to subfamily Calamoideae. The greatest diversity of rattan palm species and genera are in the clos ...