Travancore Fanam

Historically, the Fanam and Chuckram coins were the regular unit of currency in medieval Travancore and appear to have been extensively used for trading in the region of South India.

The words Fanam and Panam literally mean money and are still used as a synonym for wealth in Kerala in the native language of Malayalam.

By the 18th century, the reduction in precious metal content had rendered the Travancore Fanam coins so small that they had become difficult to count.

[3] These modern versions were minted in Trivandrum (now called Thiruvananthapuram) with the aid of stamping presses obtained from Madras Presidency.

The Fanam coins, when written in English, appear to display something similar to an Anglo-Germanic sound shift (called Grimm's law) from the traditional term "Panam".

Panam literally means money in several Dravidian languages of South India and is still extensively used to refer to wealth.