Watch List notes:

ASSASSINS AT ALAMUT: Muhammad III, 1221-1254, AV dinar (2.56g), MM, AH618, A-D1920, dated in the year of his accession, citing the Abbasid caliph al-Nasir li-din Allah, slightly uneven surfaces, unpublished and almost certainly unique and of great historic importance, VF to EF, RRRR. Muhammad's father, the Batinid Imam Hasan III, converted to Sunnism almost immediately after his appointment in 607 / 1210, and remained Sunni until his death in 618 / 1221. The next Imam, his son Muhammad III, accepted Sunnism at first, but soon afterwards resumed the Isma'ili faith. The historians do not clearly mention a specific year when he abandoned Sunnism, but the general estimate is that he remained Sunni for at least several years, almost certainly well after AH 622, the year of the caliph al-Nasir's death. Since al-Nasir is cited on this coin, it was struck within the years that Muhammad b. Hasan remained a Sunni (the date 618 is weak but certain). The style is very similar to contemporary issues of the Khwarizmshah 'Ala al-Din Muhammad, so it must have been minted at one of the mints in or just south of Khorasan, parts of which remained outside the Khwarizmshah territories, perhaps Maymana, where his silver coins were struck in AH619.

Estimate: 4,500-5,500 USD