2017-02-24 Fri

Today these chants of “Har Har Mahadev” fill the Indian air in its full glory of Lord Shiva. According to Hindu philosophy, Lord Shiva is the Destroyer of Evil, passionate lover, ferocious warrior, protector, lord of cosmic dance, powerful yet incorruptible force and accompanied with a fearsome temper.

Today, Hindus all over the world celebrate this auspicious occasion of Mahashivratri. It is the day, when Shiva and Parvati met for the first time. In India, Shiva is worshiped with different names and forms as depicted in sculptures and coins. The most significant of them all are, coins. Throughout the Indian coinage, many dynasties have depicted Lord Shiva in different forms or with his consort Parvati. An excellent example of this is the Gold Half Pagoda of Vijay-Nagar Kingdom.

This Half Pagoda was minted, during the reign of Harihara II. The obverse flan of this coin depicts Shiva-Parvati in seating position. The reverse flan depicts a legend in devanagari script “Sri Par/ Ta pa ha ri / Ha ra”. This Uma-Mahesvara type of coin comes in two varieties; one holds a ‘Damru’ and other hold an axe.

Many other kings and dynasties, issued coins depicting Lord Shiva in symbolic form of linga, Bela patra, trident, Om , Ekalinga on coins even linga was used as a symbol of mintmark. The few examples for these symbolic forms are, Khushan dynasty (Shiva as Oesho), Vijay Manikya of Tripura, Holkar of Indore, Ujjain City state, Maratha coins of Aurangzeb(mintmark linga), Haidar Ali’s Gold Pagoda, Rana Khumbha-karana of Mewar, King Kumaraguta and Skandagupta of Gupta dynasty etc.

In Vedas, he was referred as ‘Rudra’, Shiva is also associated with ‘Agni’ and ‘Indra’ later on ‘Rudra-shiva’- the purest one. Lord Shiva is worshipped in the form of ‘Jotir-linga’, there are twelve Jotir-linga across India. Maha Shivaratri is celebrated every year at the 13th night or 14th day in Krishna-Paksha of Maagha or Phalguna month (According to Hindu calendar) where devotes worship lord Shiva in the Linga form.

Mintage world wishes you all a happy and enlightening eMahashivaratri....

To read more about Lord Shiva’s Nataraja form Click here