A COIN UNITES VICTORIA & ABDUL

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V21 2018 INDEX E-SYLUM ARCHIVE

The E-Sylum: Volume 21, Number 31, August 5, 2018, Article 31

My wife and I just watched the Victoria & Abdul movie on HBO. If you haven't seen it, do. Superb.

The pivotal moment is the presentation of a specimen British Indian Mohur to Queen Victoria by the protagonist Abdul for her 1887 jubilee. Accurate depiction of coin too. No regular 1887 for these though, perhaps there's one minted for the ceremony, now in the Royal collections somewhere. Coins central to movies are very rare!

Here's an excerpt from a review in The Atlantic. -Editor

The story begins in 1887, with the Queen's Golden Jubilee, the 50th anniversary of her ascension to the throne. In her honor, a ceremonial coin is minted in India, which has been under formal British rule for nearly three decades. Two Indian clerks are chosen to present the coin by virtue of their height: Karim (played by Ali Fazal), who is in fact tall, and Mohammed (Adeel Akhtar), who is not, and was instead a last-minute fill-in.

Arriving in England, the two are instructed in the niceties of the Court (“The key to good service is standing still and moving backwards”), and solid comic mileage is gotten out of the elaborate etiquette and pantomime of a state dinner. Karim is entranced; Mohammed, not so much. (“The place is completely barbaric,” he complains, citing—in a clever inversion—the English consumption of food featuring pig's blood and sheep's brains.)

Despite instructions that he make no eye contact with the queen, Karim does exactly that at the first opportunity. She returns his gaze and, later, noting his height and looks, decides to bring him gradually into her service. She asks him to teach her Urdu and to describe the taste of a mango. Soon she has declared him her “Munshi,” or teacher, awarded him Mohammed as a servant, and had his burqa-wearing wife and mother-in-law brought to England.

Here's what the History vs Hollywood site has to say. -Editor

Not exactly, or at least not entirely. Prior to arriving in England, Abdul Karim had worked as a prison clerk in Uttar Pradesh, India, which had been under formal British rule for close to three decades. According to the Victoria and Abdul true story, the jail's superintendent, John Tyler, had met the Queen at the Colonial and Indian Exhibition of 1886, where he showcased carpets the inmates had made as part of a rehabilitation program. The Queen was impressed and asked Tyler to select two Indian attendants to help her at her Golden Jubilee, which marked fifty years of being on the throne. She wanted help communicating with the Indian dignitaries in attendance. In part due to his tallness, Abdul Karim, then 24, was chosen. In the movie, he first presents a newly minted ceremonial coin to the 81-year-old Queen. -Smithsonian Magazine

To read the earlier E-Sylum article, see:
VICTORIA AND ABDUL (2017) (http://www.historyvshollywood.com/reelfaces/victoria-and-abdul/)

Can anyone confirm the numismatic details of the coin and its whereabouts today? -Editor