The dirham, dirhem or drahm is a unit of currency and of mass. It is the name of the currencies of

Morocco Morocco, officially the Kingdom of Morocco, is a country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. It has coastlines on the Mediterranean Sea to the north and the Atlantic Ocean to the west, and has land borders with Algeria to Algeria–Morocc ...

, the

United Arab Emirates The United Arab Emirates (UAE), or simply the Emirates, is a country in West Asia, in the Middle East, at the eastern end of the Arabian Peninsula. It is a Federal monarchy, federal elective monarchy made up of Emirates of the United Arab E ...

and

Armenia Armenia, officially the Republic of Armenia, is a landlocked country in the Armenian Highlands of West Asia. It is a part of the Caucasus region and is bordered by Turkey to the west, Georgia (country), Georgia to the north and Azerbaijan to ...

, and is the name of a currency subdivision in

Jordan Jordan, officially the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, is a country in the Southern Levant region of West Asia. Jordan is bordered by Syria to the north, Iraq to the east, Saudi Arabia to the south, and Israel and the occupied Palestinian ter ...

Libya Libya, officially the State of Libya, is a country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. It borders the Mediterranean Sea to the north, Egypt to Egypt–Libya border, the east, Sudan to Libya–Sudan border, the southeast, Chad to Chad–L ...

Qatar Qatar, officially the State of Qatar, is a country in West Asia. It occupies the Geography of Qatar, Qatar Peninsula on the northeastern coast of the Arabian Peninsula in the Middle East; it shares Qatar–Saudi Arabia border, its sole land b ...

and

Tajikistan Tajikistan, officially the Republic of Tajikistan, is a landlocked country in Central Asia. Dushanbe is the capital city, capital and most populous city. Tajikistan borders Afghanistan to the Afghanistan–Tajikistan border, south, Uzbekistan to ...

. It was historically a silver coin. Silver Dirham

Unit of mass

The dirham was a unit of mass used across North Africa, the Middle East, Persia and Ifat; later known as Adal, with varying values. The value of Islamic dirham was 14 qirat. 10 dirham equals 7 mithqal (2.975 gm of silver). In the late Ottoman Empire (), the standard dirham was 3.207 g; 400 dirhem equal one oka. The Ottoman dirham was based on the

Sasanian The Sasanian Empire (), officially Eranshahr ( , "Empire of the Iranians"), was an Iranian empire that was founded and ruled by the House of Sasan from 224 to 651. Enduring for over four centuries, the length of the Sasanian dynasty's reign ...

drachm (in

Middle Persian Middle Persian, also known by its endonym Pārsīk or Pārsīg ( Inscriptional Pahlavi script: , Manichaean script: , Avestan script: ) in its later form, is a Western Middle Iranian language which became the literary language of the Sasania ...

: 𐭦𐭥𐭦𐭭 ''drahm''), which was itself based on the Greek dram/drachma. In

Egypt Egypt ( , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a country spanning the Northeast Africa, northeast corner of Africa and Western Asia, southwest corner of Asia via the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Mediterranean Sea to northe ...

in 1895, it was equivalent to 47.661 troy grains (3.088 g). There is currently a movement within the Islamic world to revive the dirham as a unit of mass for measuring silver, although the exact value is disputed (either 3 or 2.975 grams).

History

The word "dirham" ultimately comes from ''

drachma Drachma may refer to: * Ancient drachma, an ancient Greek currency * Modern drachma The drachma ( ) was the official currency of modern Greece from 1832 until the launch of the euro in 2001. First modern drachma The drachma was reintroduce ...

'' (δραχμή), the Greek coin.''

Oxford English Dictionary The ''Oxford English Dictionary'' (''OED'') is the principal historical dictionary of the English language, published by Oxford University Press (OUP), a University of Oxford publishing house. The dictionary, which published its first editio ...

'', 1st edition
s.v. 'dirhem'
The Greek-speaking

Byzantine Empire The Byzantine Empire, also known as the Eastern Roman Empire, was the continuation of the Roman Empire centred on Constantinople during late antiquity and the Middle Ages. Having survived History of the Roman Empire, the events that caused the ...

lay partially in the

Levant The Levant ( ) is the subregion that borders the Eastern Mediterranean, Eastern Mediterranean sea to the west, and forms the core of West Asia and the political term, Middle East, ''Middle East''. In its narrowest sense, which is in use toda ...

and traded with

Arabia The Arabian Peninsula (, , or , , ) or Arabia, is a peninsula in West Asia, situated north-east of Africa on the Arabian plate. At , comparable in size to India, the Arabian Peninsula is the largest peninsula in the world. Geographically, the ...

, circulating the coin there in pre-Islamic times and afterward. It was this currency which was initially adopted as a Persian word (

''drahm'' or ''dram''); then near the end of the 7th century the coin became an Islamic currency bearing the name of the sovereign and a religious verse. The Arabs introduced their own coins. The Islamic dirham was 8 daniq. The dirham was struck in many Mediterranean countries, including

Al-Andalus Al-Andalus () was the Muslim-ruled area of the Iberian Peninsula. The name refers to the different Muslim states that controlled these territories at various times between 711 and 1492. At its greatest geographical extent, it occupied most o ...

(

Moorish The term Moor is an exonym used in European languages to designate the Muslim populations of North Africa (the Maghreb) and the Iberian Peninsula (particularly al-Andalus) during the Middle Ages. Moors are not a single, distinct or self-defi ...

Spain Spain, or the Kingdom of Spain, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe with territories in North Africa. Featuring the Punta de Tarifa, southernmost point of continental Europe, it is the largest country in Southern Eur ...

) and the

(''

miliaresion The ''miliaresion'' (, from ), is a name used for two types of Byzantine silver coins. In its most usual sense, it refers to the themed flat silver coin struck between the 8th and 11th Century. History Originally, the name was given to a series ...

''), and could be used as currency in

Europe Europe is a continent located entirely in the Northern Hemisphere and mostly in the Eastern Hemisphere. It is bordered by the Arctic Ocean to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the west, the Mediterranean Sea to the south, and Asia to the east ...

between the 10th and 12th centuries, notably in areas with

Viking Vikings were seafaring people originally from Scandinavia (present-day Denmark, Norway, and Sweden), who from the late 8th to the late 11th centuries raided, pirated, traded, and settled throughout parts of Europe.Roesdahl, pp. 9� ...

connections, such as Viking York and Dublin.

Dirham in Jewish orthodox law

The ''dirham'' is frequently mentioned in

Jewish Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of History of ancient Israel and Judah, ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, rel ...

orthodox law as a unit of weight used to measure various requirements in religious functions, such as the weight in silver specie pledged in Marriage Contracts ('' Ketubbah''), the quantity of flour requiring the separation of the dough-portion, etc. Jewish physician and philosopher,

Maimonides Moses ben Maimon (1138–1204), commonly known as Maimonides (, ) and also referred to by the Hebrew acronym Rambam (), was a Sephardic rabbi and Jewish philosophy, philosopher who became one of the most prolific and influential Torah schola ...

, uses the Egyptian ''dirham'' to approximate the quantity of flour for dough-portion, writing in

Mishnah The Mishnah or the Mishna (; , from the verb ''šānā'', "to study and review", also "secondary") is the first written collection of the Jewish oral traditions that are known as the Oral Torah. Having been collected in the 3rd century CE, it is ...

Eduyot Tractate Eduyot (Hebrew: עדויות, lit. "testimonies") is the seventh tractate in the order Nezikin of the Mishnah. When, after the destruction of the Temple, it became necessary, through the removal of R. Gamaliel II from the office of patri ...

'' 1:2: "And I found the rate of the dough-portion in that measurement to be approximately five-hundred and twenty ''dirhams'' of wheat flour, while all these dirhams are the Egyptian 'dirham''" This view is repeated by

Maran Maran () is a Jewish honorific prefix for exceptionally respected rabbis. It is an alternate form of Aramaic ''mar'', meaning "master" (compare '' rav'', ''rabban''). Maran is especially preferred among Sephardic Jews, and commonly used in re ...

's ''

Shulhan Arukh The ''Shulhan Arukh'' ( ),, often called "the Code of Jewish Law", is the most widely consulted of the various legal codes in Rabbinic Judaism. It was authored in the city of Safed in what is now Israel by Joseph Karo in 1563 and published in V ...

'' (''Hil. Hallah'',

Yoreh Deah ''Yoreh De'ah'' () is a section of Rabbi Jacob ben Asher's compilation of halakha (Jewish law), the ''Arba'ah Turim'', written around 1300. This section treats all aspects of Jewish law not pertinent to the Hebrew calendar, finance, torts, mar ...

§ 324:3) in the name of the Tur. In Maimonides' commentary of the Mishnah (''Eduyot'' 1:2, note 18), Rabbi

Yosef Qafih Yosef Qafiḥ ( , ), widely known as Rabbi Yosef Kapach (27 November 1917 – 21 July 2000), was a Yemenite-Israeli posek, authority on Jewish religious law (''halakha''), a Dayan (rabbinic judge), dayan of the Judiciary of Israel#Jewish courts, ...

explains that the weight of each Egyptian ''dirham'' was approximately 3.333 grams, or what was the equivalent to 16

carob The carob ( ; ''Ceratonia siliqua'') is a flowering evergreen tree or shrub in the Caesalpinioideae sub-family of the legume family, Fabaceae. It is widely cultivated for its edible fruit, which takes the form of seed pods, and as an ornam ...

-grains which, when taken together, the minimum weight of flour requiring the separation of the dough-portion comes to approx. 1 kilo and 733 grams. Rabbi Ovadiah Yosef, in his ''Sefer Halikhot ʿOlam'' (vol. 1, pp. 288–291), makes use of a different standard for the Egyptian ''dirham'', saying that it weighed approx. 3.0 grams, meaning the minimum requirement for separating the

priest A priest is a religious leader authorized to perform the sacred rituals of a religion, especially as a mediatory agent between humans and one or more deity, deities. They also have the authority or power to administer religious rites; in parti ...

's portion is 1 kilo and 560 grams. Others (e.g. Rabbi Avraham Chaim Naeh) say the Egyptian ''dirham'' weighed approx. 3.205 grams, which total weight for the requirement of separating the dough-portion comes to 1 kilo and 666 grams. Rabbi Shelomo Qorah (Chief Rabbi of

Bnei Barak Bnei Brak ( ) or Bene Beraq, is a city located on the central Mediterranean coastal plain in Israel, just east of Tel Aviv. A center of Haredi Judaism, Bnei Brak covers an area of 709 hectares (1,752 acres, or 2.74 square miles), and had a popula ...

) wrote that the traditional weight used in

Yemen Yemen, officially the Republic of Yemen, is a country in West Asia. Located in South Arabia, southern Arabia, it borders Saudi Arabia to Saudi Arabia–Yemen border, the north, Oman to Oman–Yemen border, the northeast, the south-eastern part ...

for each ''dirham'' weighed 3.20 grams for a total of 31.5 ''dirhams'' given as the redemption of one's firstborn son (''

pidyon haben The ''pidyon haben'' () or redemption of the first-born son is a mitzvah in Judaism whereby a Jewish firstborn son is "redeemed" with money. The redemption is attained by paying five silver coins to a kohen (a patrilineal descendant of the pr ...

''), or 3.36 grams for the 30 ''dirhams'' required by the

(''Yoreh De'ah'' 305:1), and which in relation to the separation of the dough-portion made for a total weight of 1 kilo and 770.72 grams. The word ''drachmon'' (), used in some translations of Maimonides' commentary of the

, has in all places the same connotation as ''dirham''.''Mishnah – with a Commentary of Rabbi Moses ben Maimon'', ed. Yosef Qafih, vol. 3 – ''Seder Kodashim'', pub. Mossad Harav Kook: Jerusalem 1967, s.v. Introduction to Tractate ''Menahoth'', p. 68 (note 35) (Hebrew title: משנה עם פירוש הרמב"ם)

Modern-day currency

Currently the valid national currencies with the name ''dirham'' are: Modern currencies with the subdivision ''dirham'' or ''diram'' are: The unofficial

modern gold dinar The modern Islamic gold dinar (sometimes referred as Islamic dinar or Gold dinar) is a projected bullion gold coin, so far not issued as official currency by any national state. It aims to revive the historical gold dinar, which was a leading c ...

, issued and/or proposed by several states and proto-states, is also divided into dirhams.

Notes

References