Artuqids of Mardin. Nasir al-Din Artuq Arslan. AH 597-637 / AD 1200-1239. Dated AH 635 (AD 1237/8). Male figure seated facing with legs crossed, resting right hand on thigh and holding globe in left; name and titles of the Seljuk overlord around / Legend in five lines citing the Abbasid Caliph al-Mustansir and Artuq Arslan; mint and date in margins. 31mm, 12.97 grams. Mardin mint. Whelan Type XIII; S&S Type 48.2; Album 1830.11. 

The medieval figural copper coins of the Artuqids, Zangids, and other contemporary Islamic dynasties are among the most remarkable and unusual issues in Islamic numismatics. Their designs frequently borrowed from ancient Greek, Roman, Byzantine, and Persian coinage, reproducing classical busts, imperial portraits, mythological figures, astrological symbols and even the bust of Christ alongside Arabic inscriptions naming Muslim rulers and their titles. This extraordinary fusion of classical imagery and Islamic epigraphy produced a distinctive and often strikingly beautiful coinage, virtually unparalleled in the medieval Islamic world.