ABSTRACT
Understanding the production, distribution and circulation of coinage in Syria-Palestine during the 7th and 8th centuries has undergone far-reaching improvements in recent decades. Through a cross-disciplinary analysis of this material, in which coin profiles are compared with other archaeological material, fresh perspectives are drawn on the way coinage notably its production and spread serves to identify major changes to social and economic conditions in Bild al-Shm during the late antique early Islamic transitional period. The need for coinage was well understood at all levels of administration, and within a few decades the upper echelons of government the Marwnid Umayyads came to appreciate the powerful social message coins could convey. Overall, base coinage no longer features in the local economy by the 8th century, and the monetary revival of the first half of the 8th century so clearly seen further north did not extend to south reaches.
