Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 17.djvu/706

Rh 648 NUMISMATICS [ASIA MINOR. Small coins follow this currency. In 166 B.C. favourable political circumstances cause a new issue of money. The Attic gold staters of this age have a strikingly dramatic style, pointing to the great local school ; the silver, with the head of Helios in profile, in the gold it is three-quarter face, is still marked by careful execution. In the latest coins, from 88 to 43 B. c., the Attic standard, now universal, whether the chief coin was called drachm or denarius, again appears. During the age after Alexander there is an abundant bronze coin age, with some pieces of unusual size. The series closes with a few imperial coins ranging from Nerva to Marcus Aurelius. Lycia. The early coinage of Lycia introduces us at once into a region of Asiatic mythology, art, and language, raising many questions as yet without an answer. The standard of the oldest coins is Persic, and it falls perhaps under Athenian influence, until it becomes equivalent with the Attic. The Lycian character belongs to the primitive alphabets of Asia Minor, which combine with archaic Greek forms others which are unknown to the Greek alphabet, and it expresses a native language as yet but imperfectly understood. The art is stiff and delights in animal forms, some times of monstrous types, which recall the designs of Phoenicia and Assyria. The most remarkable symbol is the so-called triquetra, an object resembling a ring, to which three or four hooks are attached. It is supposed to be a solar symbol like the swastika. The oldest money, probably dating from about 480 B.C., has a boar or his fore-part and an incuse. This is succeeded by a series in which the hooked ring is the usual reverse type. It bears Lycian inscriptions, which may usually denote tribes ; one certainly indi cates the town of Tlos. This coinage probably reaches as late as Alexander s time. It is followed by silver and bronze money of the Lycian League before Augustus and under his reign, but ceasing in that of Claudius, -the usual types of the chief silver piece, a hemidrachm, being the head of Apollo and the lyre. Besides this general currency there are some special ones of towns not in the League. The imperial money rarely goes beyond the reign of Augustus, and is resumed during that of Gordian III. There is a remarkable coin of Myra of this emperor, showing the goddess of the city, of a type like the Ephesian Artemis, in a tree ; two woodcutters, each armed with a double axe, hew at the trunk, from which two serpents rise as if to protect it and aid the goddess. Phaselis is an exceptional town, for it has early Greek coins, the leading type being a galley. Pamphy- The coinage of Pamphylia offers some examples of good art dis- lia. tinctly marked by the Asiatic formality. Aspemlus shows a remark able series of Persic didrachms, extending from about 480 B.C. to Alexander s time. The oldest coins have the types of a warrior and the triskelion or three legs, more familiarly associated with Sicily ; it is probably a solar symbol. One has an extraordinary reverse type, in which the triskelion is engraved upon an advancing lion, also, held to have a solar meaning. These coins are followed by a long series with the types of two wrestlers engaged and a slinger. The main legend is almost always in the Pamphylian character and language. There are also very curious imperial types. The money of Perga is very interesting. It begins in archaic style, and is resumed after the age of Alexander with Greek types of the Artemis of Perga. Her figure in a remarkable Asiatic form occurs in the long imperial series. Bronze coins earlier in date than the silver money with the Greek types have the Pamphylian title of the goddess, read by V. M. Ramsay (Hellenic Journal), FANA22AS LTPEIIAS, &quot;of the queen of Perga.&quot; Side has at first Persic didrachms of about 480 B.C., their types the pome granate and dolphin and mystical eye, or pomegranate and dol phin and head of Athene ; then there are satrapal money of about 400 B.C. and late Attic tetradrachms, their types being the head of Athene and Nice, of about the first century B.C., for they are imitated by Amyntas, king of Galatia. Pisidia, The money of Pisidia is chiefly imperial. There is a long series &c. of this class of the colonia Antiochia. The autonomous coins of Selge have the wrestlers and the slinger of Aspendus in inferior and even barbarous copies. Of Isauria and Lycaonia a few cities strike coins of imperial class or time. Cilicia. Cilicia, a coastland, is numismatically of high interest. Celen- deris, a colony of Samos, has archaic coins of ^Eginetic weight, their type a goat, the reverse being incuse. These are followed by a splendid coinage of transitional and fine art, with a horseman seated sideways on the obverse and on the reverse a goat kneeling on one knee. The latest, about 400 B.C., are free from stiffness, and the horseman may be favourably compared with the similar types of Tarentum. The weight is the Persic didrachm. Mallus has a most interesting series of silver coins, some with curious Asiatic types. Of Nagidus there are Persic didrachms of good style, one intei esting type being Aphrodite seated, before whom Eros flies crowning her, with, on the other side, a standing Dionysus. Soli has silver coins of the same weight, the types being the head of Athene, one variety imitated from remote Velia, and a bunch of grapes ; they are anterior to Alexander. The coinage of Tarsus begins with rough and thick tetradrachms of Attic weight, evidently issued soon after Alexander s reign, and for no long time subse quently. The types are the Baal of Tarsus and a lion. The auto nomous bronze of the Seleucid age shows the remarkable subject of the pyre of Sandan, the local form of Heracles ; and there is a long and curious imperial series. The coinage of the great island of Cyprus is, as we might expect Cyprus, from its monuments, almost exclusively non-Hellenic in character. The weight-system, except of gold, which is Attic, is Persic, save only in the later coins of the kings of Salamis, who strike on the reduced Rhodian standard. The art is usually very stiff down to about 400 B.C., with types of Egypto-Plm iiician or Phoenician or of Greek origin. The inscriptions are in the Cyprian character, belonging to the interesting group of alphabets of Asia Minor, of which the Lycian and Pamphylian are instances. The character has been read, and the attributions of the coins are thus taking shape. The prevalent types are animals or their heads, the chief subjects being the bull, eagle, sheep, lion, the lion seizing the stag, the deer, and the mythical sphinx. The divinities we can recog nize are Aphrodite, Heracles, Athene, Hermes, and Zeus Ammon. But the most curious mythological types are a goddess carried by a bull or by a ram, in both cases probably Astarte, the Phoenician Aphrodite. The most remarkable symbol is the well-known Egyp tian sign of life. The coins appear to have been struck by kings until before the age of Alexander, when civic money appears. There are two well-defined currencies, that of the kings of Salamis, who claimed a Greek origin, and that of the Phoenician dynasty of Citium. The coins of the Salaminian line are in silver and gold. The earlier have Cyprian, the later Greek inscriptions, the types generally being native, though after a time under Hellenic influ ence. They are of Evagoras I., Nicocles, Evagoras II., Pnytagoras, and Nicocreon, and the coinage is closed by Menelaus, brother of Ptolemy I., who, of course, does not take the regal title. The kings of Citium from 448 to 332 B.C., Baalmelek, Azbaal, Melekiaton, and Pumiaton, strike silver and in one case gold, their general types being Heracles, and the lion seizing the stag. Bronze begins soon after 400 B.C., and of the same age there are autonomous pieces, one of Paphos in silver, and several of Salamis in bronze. There is Greek imperial money from Augustus to Caracalla. The most remarkable type is the temple at Paphos, represented as a structure of two stories with wings. Within the central portion is the sacred stone, in front a semicircular court. The earliest coinage of Lydia is no doubt that of the kings, Lydia. already described. The next currency must have been of Persian darics (gold) and drachms (silver), followed by that of Alexander, the Seleucids, and the Attalids of Pergamum, and then by the cistophori of the province of Asia. There is an abundant bronze coinage of the cities, autonomous from the formation of the province, and of imperial time, but mostly of the imperial class. The largest curren cies are of Magnesia, Philadelphia, Sardis, Thyatira, and Tralles. The art is not remarkable, though good for the period, and the types are mostly Greek. The coinage of Phrygia has the same general characteristics as Phrygia, that of Lydia. Among noteworthy types must be noticed Men or Lunus, the Phrygian moon-god, and the legendary Minos. There are curious types of Apamea, surnamed Kibotos or the Ark, and more anciently Celsenre. One of Severus represents the legend of the invention of the double pipe, a type already described. Of the same and later emperors are coins bearing the famous type of the ark of Noah and the name NfiE. The town of Cibyra is remark able for a silver coinage, of which the large pieces have the weight of cistophori. They are of the first century B.C., and were prob ably struck by one or more tyrants of the four confederate cities of which Cibyra was the head, a state which came to an end 84 B.C. Galatia has little to offer of interest. Trajan issued bronze im- Galatia. perial coins for the province, and there is imperial money of Ancyra and Pessinus, besides other series of less importance. The only remarkable regal issue is that of Amyntas, Strabo s contemporary, who struck tetradrachms, imitating the late money of Side. With the coinage of Cappadocia we bid farewell to Greek art and Cappa- enter on the domain of Oriental conventionalism, succeeded by inferior docia,&c. Roman design coarsely executed. There is one large imperial series, that of Cjesarea, which numismatists have unduly increased by the introduction of many uncertain coins, all of which cannot even be proved to be Asiatic. The issues range from Tiberius to Gordian III., and are in silver and bronze. The most common type is the sacred Mount Argseus, on which a statue is sometimes seen, a remarkable type curiously varied. There are scanty issues of a few other towns. There is an interesting series of coins of the kings of Cappadocia, who struck Attic drachms, and far more rarely tetra drachms. The usual names are Ariarathes and Ariobarzanes, the first being that of the old line who claimed descent from one of the Persian chiefs who slew the Magian. The earliest coins are of Aria rathes IV. (220-163 B.C.). The rare tetradrachms of Orophernes, a successful claimant in the next reign, bear a fine portrait. There are also tetradrachms of Ariarathes V. and of another king of the same name, a son of Mithradates of Pontus, put by him on the Cappadocian throne. The coins of Archelaus, the last king set up