Owner Comments:
Enough of the date is visible around the rim to place this dinar at AH 661 / AD 1263. Baybars is one of the very few guys who ever managed to defeat a Mongol army in the 1200's. This coin is lustrous and sharp, but, there is a significant ding you can see on the reverse rim about 5:30.
Name and title of Baybars in four lines across field; below, heraldic lion passant left / "In the name of God, there is no God except him, He who sent His Messenger with guidance and the religion of truth", in five lines across field; mint and (partly off flan) date around.
More about Baybars. He was a slave, sold in the markets of the Seljuks of Rum.
He beat the Mongols. He beat the French King. He rooted out all the last vestiges of the Crusaders in the Levant. He made a deal with King Edward I of England, "Longshanks", who came to crusade when he was just Prince "Lord" Edward, oldest son of King Henry III. Edward went on to adopt, or be nicknamed, a leopard himself. ("Perhaps he will be rightly called a leopard.") I wonder if he got the idea from Baybars.
It looks like Baybars may have gotten the idea of the leopard on this coin from a recently struck silver coin of the Seljuks of Rum, by Ghiyath al-Din Kay Khusraw II, during his first reign, AH 634-644 / AD 1237-1246.
When the Ilkhan Hulagu conquered Baghdad in Muharram 656h, he massacred the Caliph and any members of the Abbasid family who fell into his clutches (See the previous coin, a dinar of that last Abbasid Caliph). In the event, Ahmad, the son of the Caliph al-Zahir, escaped and made his way westwards to seek refuge with the Mamluk ruler, al-Zahir Baybars. Baybars fitted him out with an army and sent him off to reconquer Baghdad, and in return for Mamluk support Ahmad became the caliph al-Mustansir, and Baybars received the title al-Sultan al-Malik.
A search of acsearch.info reveals that there are a fair number of these out there, from various mints, and many failed to sell at auction. This is not the nicest one, but, is among the nicer ones. Higher values come from less common mints, and, from full inclusion of the date in the margin, which is mostly visible on this coin.
Bought raw from Jean Elsen early March, 2020, as Corona Virus hysteria engulfed Europe and soon the USA. Coin shows and auctions worldwide have been moved, closed to the public, or downright cancelled.