1 Pitis

Samudra-Pasai, on the northern tip of Sumatra, was the first Muslim sultanate in Southeast Asia, and its tin coinage reflects the region's dependence on locally abundant metal rather than the gold and silver standards of the Islamic world further west. The pitis circulated as fractional currency in a port economy built almost entirely on the pepper trade, where Chinese, Arab, and Javanese merchants all operated simultaneously. Chinese cash coins were the dominant competitor in small transactions, which likely constrained how far the pitis ever penetrated inland markets.