Extremely fine, Unique.

Unique and Historically Important Silver Tanka of Suryavanshi Khandayat Gajapati Kings of Odisha.

This unique silver tanka of Pratapa Rudra Deva, the Gajapati king, is historically significant for a number of reasons. It is the first known coin to bear all the major titles of the Gajapati kings - 'Gaudeshwara' (lord of Gauda) for winning battles against the Sultans of Bengal and 'Karnāta-Kalabaradheepa' (sovereign of Karnataka and Kalabara = Kalaburagi = Gulbarga) for having conquered the territories of Vijayanagara and the Bahmani sultans of Gulbarga. Pratapa Rudra also calls himself 'Venkata' (alluding to his kingdom extending to Tirupati) and 'Kakatiya', to denote his ancestral connection to this important Telugu dynasty. The last two lines of the reverse inscription are titles, which extol Pratapa Rudra's virtues like mastery in music and dance. In his inscription at Puri, Pratapa Rudra Deva calls himself "a confluence of Music and Literature".