Interactions of change: Pursuing agentive materials and intangible movements along the silk road network

Mined from the mountainous and arid landscapes of the Islamic World, collected and transported across Eurasian sea- and riverways, and deposited in Northern Eurasian fields and forests, silver Islamic coins circulated far and wide in transcontinental trade. Although these itinerant materials have rarely been regarded as 'Silk Road' coinage, Islamic silver contains unambiguous associations with people and landscapes connected by the 'Silk Road' network. These coins circulated throughout and helped shape the late 'Silk Road' network across Afro-Eurasian landscapes, namely during the eighth to tenth centuries AD. As material traces of long-distance interactions between the Islamic World and Northern Eurasia, Islamic coins provide an important case study for the ways that archaeologists can consider trade and economic interactions more broadly than simply the hand-to-hand exchange of goods between humans. To illustrate the effectiveness of this approach, I examine surviving Abbasid coin assemblages, which are housed today in museum collections around the world, from a 'Silk Road' network perspective that recognizes materials as influential agents that helped forge transformative interactions between Afro-Eurasian communities.