Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 17.djvu/709

Rh EGYPT.] NUMISMATICS 651 is good ; afterwards they become coarse and careless. At first the fine pieces were issued by the Phoenician, Cyprian, and other foreign mints, the Egyptian work being usually inferior. While the Seleucids were still striking good coins, the Ptolemies allowed their money to fall into barbarism in Egypt and even in Cyprus. The obverse type is a royal head, that of Ptolemy I. being the ordinary silver type, while that of Arsinoe II. was long but not uninterruptedly continued on the gold. The head of Zeus Ammon is most usual on the bronze coinage. A type once adopted was usually retained. Thus Ptolemy I., Arsinoe II., Ptolemy IV., Cleopatra 1., have a kind of commemoration in the coinage on the analogy of the priesthoods established in honour of each royal pair. The almost universal type of reverse of all metals is the Ptolemaic badge, the eagle on the thunderbolt, which, in spite of variety, is always heraldic. For art and iconography this series is far inferior to that of the Seleu cids. The weight after the earlier part of the reign of Ptolemy I. is Phoenician for gold and silver and either Attic or Egyptian for the bronze. The chief coins are octadrachms in gold and tetradrachms in silver, besides the abundant bronze money. Ptolemy I. appears to have issued his money while regent for Philip Arrliidseus ; it only differs in the royal name from that of Alexander ; but as yet it has not been possible to separate Ptolemy s coinage from that of the other generals. He then struck money for Alexander IV. on the Attic standard with the head of Alexander the Great, with the horn of Ammon in the elephant s skin and Alexander s reverse. He soon adopted a new reverse, that of Pallas Promachos, and next lowered the coins to the Rhodian standard. This money lie continued to strike after the young king s death until he himself took the royal title, when he issued his own money, his portrait on the one side and the eagle and thunderbolt with his name as king on the other, and adopted the Phoenician standard. This type in silver, with the inscription &quot;Ptolemy the king,&quot; is thenceforward the regular cur rency. He also issued pentadrachms in gold, and he or his successor octadrachms in silver. Ptolemy II. (Philadelphus), the richest of the family, continued his father s coinage, and, having acquired the cities of Phoenicia, struck money there with his father s title Soter, while the Egyptian coinage merely bore the title of king : the one was a commemorative coinage, the other, though bearing the portrait of Ptolemy I., was issued in the name of the reigning sovereign. Phil adelphus probably began the issue of the gold octadrachms with the busts of Ptolemy I. and Berenice I., Ptolemy II. and Arsinoe II., and certainly struck beautiful octadrachms in gold and decadrachms in silver of Arsinoe II., the gold being long afterwards continued. The Phoenician octadrachms and tetradrachms are dated by the king s reign. Philadelphus also began the great bronze issues of the system which includes the largest coin, sometimes exceeding 1 400 grains in weight. Ptolemy III. (Euergetes I. ) continued his father s coinages, after awhile abandoning the dates in Phoenicia. He also struck fine gold octadrachms with his own portrait. His queen Berenice II., striking in her own right as heiress of the Cyrenaica and also as consort, but with the royal title only given to heiresses in the Ptolemaic line, issued a beautiful currency with her portrait, both octadrachms and decadrachms like those of Arsinoe, and a coinage for the Cyrenaica of peculiar divisions. Under Ptolemy IV. ( Philopator) the coinage in its scantiness bears witness to the decline of the state, but the gold octadrachms are continued with his portrait and that of Arsinoe III. Ptolemy V. (Epiphanes) still strikes octadrachms with his portrait, and begins the continuous series of the tetradrachms of the three great cities of Cyprus, which, bearing regnal years, afford invaluable aid in the classing of his and the later coinages. Among the money of the regency of Cleo patra I. must be noticed a copper coin with her portrait. Contem poraneously with it begins the series of Ptolemy VI. (Philometor), broken by the invasion of Antiochus IV. (Epiphanes). This and the money of Philometor s brother and successor Ptolemy Physcon are only remarkable for the many dates they bear, and.so with the coin age of succeeding kings, all showing a gradual degradation of art and ultimately a great debasement in metal. In the latest series, the money of the famous Cleopatra VII., it is interesting to note the Egyptian variety of her head, also occurring on Greek im perial money and on that of Ascalon. In Egypt we have the best executed and one of the youngest portraits, and it shows that her face was marked by strong characteristics of acuteness and mobility rather than of beauty. Under the Roman rule the imperial money of Alexandria, the coinage of the province of Egypt, is the most remarkable in its class for its extent and the interest and variety of its types ; and it deserves a more careful study than it has received. It begins under Augustus and ends with the usurper or patriot Achilleus, called on his money Domitius Domitianus, overthrown by Diocletian, thus lasting longer than Greek imperial money elsewhere. In the earlier period there are potin coins continuing the base tetradrachms struck by Auletes, and bronze money of several sizes. The types are very various, and may be broadly divided into Greek, Graco-Roman, and Gneco-Egyptian. The Grseco-Roman types have the closest analogy to those of Rome herself ; the Grieco-Egyptian are of high interest as a special class illustrative of the latest phase of Egyptian mythology. These native types do not immediately appear, but from the time of Domitian they are of great frequency. The money of Trajan, Hadrian, and Antoninus Pius is abundant and interesting. A coin of Antoninus, dated in his sixth year, records the beginning of a new Sothiac cycle of 1460 years, which happened in the emperor s second year (139 A.D.). The reverse type is a crested crane, the Egyptian bennu or phoenix, with a kind of radiate nimbus round its head, and the inscription AKIN. Under Claudius II. (Gothicus) and thenceforward there is but a single kind of coin of bronze washed with silver. In this series we note the money of Zenobia and of the sons of Odenathus, Vabalathus and Athenodorus. Coins of the nomes of Egypt were struck only by Trajan, Hadrian, and Antoninus Pius. Their metal is bronze, and they are of different sizes. They were struck at the metropolis of each nome, and their types relate to the local worship, and so illustrate the Egyptian religion under a form modified by Greek influence. The inscrip tions are the names of the nomes. There is an exceptional coin of the town of Pelusium. Passing by the unimportant coinage of the Libyans, we reach the Gyrene, interesting series of the Cyrenaica, the one truly Greek currency of Africa. It begins under the line of Battus (640-450 B. c. ), and reaches to the Roman rule as far as the reign of Augustus. There are coins without the name of any city, which we may consider to be of the Cyrenaica generally, and others of Cyrene, Barca, Euesperides, and smaller towns. The weight of the gold always, and of the silver until some date not long after 450 B.C., is Attic; afterwards it is Phoenician, of the Samian variety. The ruling types are the silphium plant and its fruit, and the head of Zeus Ammon, first bearded then beardless. The art is vigorous, and in the transitional and fine period has the best Greek qualities. It is clearly an out lying branch of the school of central Greece. The oldest coins are of the class which is without the name of any city. So archaic are they that they may vie in antiquity with the first issues of Lydia and of jEgina, and date in the 7th century B.C. The money of Cyrene begins later, it may be a little before the fall of the kings in 450 B. c. It comprises a -fine gold series of Attic staters with the types of the Olympian Zeus, more rarely Zeus Ammon, and a victorious quadriga. Barca has a smaller coinage than Cyrene. It comprises a wonderful tetradrachm (Phoenician), with the head of Ammon bearded, boldly represented, absolutely full face, and three silphiums joined, between their heads an owl, a chameleon, and a jerboa. The money of Euesperides is less important. The Ptole maic currency of the Cyrenaica has been already noticed. Syrtica and Byzacena offer little of interest. Their coins are late bronze, first with Punic inscriptions, then in imperial times with Latin and Punic or Latin. Latin and Greek are used in the same coins at Leptis Minor in Byzacena. In Zeugitana the great currency of Carthage is the last repre- Carthage, sentative of Greek money, for, despite its Orientalism, its origin is Hellenic, and of this origin it is at first not unworthy. Its range in time is from about 400 B. c. to the fall of Carthage in 146 B. c. The earliest coins are Attic tetradrachms of the class usually called Siculo- Punic. It has been usual to consider these coins as having been wholly struck by the Carthaginians in Sicily, like the undoubted Sicilian money of their settlements there and those absolute imi tations of Syracusan money which may be as reasonably classed to the island. But those who insist on the attribution of the whole so-called Siculo-Punic class to Sicily leave Carthage without any but a provincial coinage for at least half a century. It is far more reasonable to infer that the earliest coinage of Carthage was struck for the whole dominion, that with purely Sicilian types being limited to Sicily. The next issues are of gold and electrum and silver, degenerating into potin. The weights are extremely difficult. In the silver money the Phoenician standard is almost universal, and we note the drachm, didrachm, tetradrachm, hexadrachm, octa- drachm, decadrachm, and dodecadrachm. Coins are also found which appear to follow the Persic standard, unless they are octobols and their doubles. While the silver is thus explicable, the gold and electrum money is very puzzling, and its very varying weights can only be explained by the theory that silver Avas the standard, and ;*old was constantly fluctuating in its relation. The earlier types are the horse or half-horse crowned by Nice and the date- palm, the head of Persephone and the horse and palm-tree, a female head in a cap, in splendid style, and a lion and a palm, and a head of young Heracles and a horse s head with a palm. It will be noted that the horse and the palm-tree are most constant. On the later coins the obverse is uniformly occupied by the head of Persephone and the reverse by the horse, sometimes with the palm, the horse s head and Pegasus being rare varieties. The bronze money imitates the later silver. The few inscriptions are extremely difficult. One that seems certain is ftWin JTIp, the &quot;new city,&quot; Carthage. The art of the earlier coins is sometimes purely Greek of Sicilian style. There is even in the best class a curious tendency to exaggeration, which gradually develops itself and finally becomes very barbarous. Roman Carthage has a bronze coinage which is insignificant. There are a few other towns which issued money with Roman legends, Utica, however, having first Punic and then