A Review of Documenting Islamic Numismatic Heritage in Malaysia: A Critical Perspective
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.24191/idealogy.v11i2.958Keywords:
numismatic, Cultural Heritage, museum, Visual arts, Islamic artAbstract
Islamic numismatic heritage represents an important yet underexamined component of Malaysia’s material, visual, and cultural heritage. Beyond their monetary function, Islamic coins function as authoritative artefacts that communicate religious identity, political legitimacy, and aesthetic values through inscriptions, calligraphic forms, and visual organisation. Despite the presence of significant Islamic coin collections within Malaysian museums and heritage institutions, documentation practices have largely prioritised material properties, chronology, and typological classification, resulting in limited engagement with visual and epigraphic interpretation. This study adopts a qualitative, literature-based approach through a critical review of existing scholarship and institutional documentation practices related to Islamic numismatics and heritage management. The analysis identifies key challenges, including physical deterioration affecting inscription legibility, inconsistent epigraphic recording, limited aesthetic analysis, and the absence of an integrated visual-oriented documentation approach. These findings indicate that current documentation practices constrain the interpretative potential of Islamic coins as cultural and visual artefacts within the context of Malay Islamic history. The paper concludes that a more integrated documentation perspective, incorporating visual and epigraphic dimensions alongside material data, is necessary to enhance the preservation, interpretation, and scholarly understanding of Islamic numismatic heritage in Malaysia. By addressing these issues, the study contributes to heritage and museum discourse and supports the development of more nuanced documentation practices for Islamic numismatic collections.
Keywords: Islamic numismatics, heritage documentation, museum practices, Islamic visual culture, coinage
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