Note 9 — Appendix: Buying and Selling Prices of Oriental Products

The larin was a silver coin that takes its name from the city [300n] of Lar in Persia. It has been current in a number of eastern countries and districts, among them Persia, the Maldives, Goa, and the Malabar coast, Ceylon, and Kandy. It has gone out of circulation, although the name is preserved in certain copper coins at the Maldives. The ancient coin was of various shapes, that of the Maldives being about as long as the finger and double, having Arabic characters stamped on it; that of Ceylon resembled a fishhook: those of Kandy are described as a piece of silver wire rolled up like a wax taper. When a person wishes to make a purchase, he cuts off as much of this silver as is equal in value to the price of the article. Its probably first mention by an European writer occurs in the Lembranças das Cousas de India (Subsidios iii, 53), in 1525, where the following table is given: 2 fules = 1 dinar; 12 dinars = 1 tanga; 3 tangas 10 dinars = 1 new larin; 3 tangas 9 dinars = 1 old larin. At Cambaye (p. 38) 1 tanga larin = 60 reis, and 45 larins weighed 1 Portuguese marco, or 50 grammes. Antonio Nunes (1554) in his Livro dos Pesos, says: “At the port of Bengala, 80 couries = 1 pone; 48 pones = 1 larin. The Portuguese marco of the time of João III, being equivalent to 2,500 reis, would make the larin worth 51,012 reis.” Davy says that the larin of Kandy was worth about 7d. in English currency. For detailed information about the larin, see Voyage of Pyrard de Laval, ut supra, i, p. 232 and note 2; and ii, p. 68.