AITOLIA Aitolian League 205BC Athena Hercules Ancient Greek Coin i56288

Item: i56288

Authentic Ancient

Greek coin of Aitolian League in Aitolia
Bronze 18mm (5.81 grams) Struck circa 205-150 B.C.
Reference: Sear 2323; HGC 4, 958; B.M.C. 7.70,71; BCD Akarnania 574-580; cf. SNG Copenhagen 37-40
Head of Athena right, in crested Corinthian helmet.
AITΩ / ΛΩN either side of Hercules standing facing, holding club and lion’s skin.

The warlike people of this district produced no coinage until the 3rd Century B.C., when the Gallic invasion of Greece occasioned the inauguration of a Federal currency.

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Authenticity.

Athena 
or Athene (Latin:

Minerva
), 
also referred to as Pallas Athena, is the goddess of war, civilization, 
wisdom, strength, strategy, crafts, justice and skill in
Greek mythology
.
Minerva
, 
Athena’s Roman incarnation, embodies similar attributes. Athena is also a shrewd 
companion of heroes
 
and the goddess
 
of heroic
 
endeavour. She is the
virgin
 
patron of Athens
. 
The Athenians built the
Parthenon
 
on the Acropolis of her namesake city, Athens, in her honour (Athena Parthenos). 
Athena’s cult as the patron of Athens seems to have existed from the earliest 
times and was so persistent that archaic myths about her were recast to adapt to 
cultural changes. In her role as a protector of the city (polis), 
many people throughout the Greek world worshiped Athena as Athena Polias 
(“Athena of the city”).
Athens
 
and Athena bear etymologically connected names.

Hercules 
is the Roman name for the Greek
divine

hero Heracles
, who was the son of

Zeus (Roman equivalent
Jupiter
) and the mortal
Alcmene
. In
classical mythology
, Hercules is famous for his 
strength and for his numerous far-ranging adventures.

The Romans adapted the Greek hero’s iconography and myths for their 
literature and art under the name Hercules. In later
Western art
and literature and in
popular culture
, Hercules is more 
commonly used than Heracles as the name of the hero. Hercules was a 
multifaceted figure with contradictory characteristics, which enabled later 
artists and writers to pick and choose how to represent him. This article 
provides an introduction to representations of Hercules in the
later tradition
.

The Aetolian League (also transliterated as Aitolian 
League) was a confederation of tribal communities and cities in
ancient Greece
centered on
Aetolia
in central Greece. It was established, 
probably during the early Hellenistic era, in opposition to
Macedon
and the
Achaean League
. Two annual meetings were held 
in
Thermika
and Panaetolika. It occupied
Delphi
from
290 BC
and gained territory steadily until, by 
the end of the 3rd century BC, it controlled the whole of central Greece outside
Attica
. At its height, the league’s territory 
included Locris
,
Malis
, Dolopes, part of
Thessaly
,
Phocis
, and
Acarnania
. In the latter part of its power, 
certain
Mediterranean
city-states joined the Aitolian 
League such as Kydonia
on
Crete
.
 

The Aetolians were not highly regarded by other Greeks, who considered them 
to be semi-barbaric and reckless. However, their league had a complex political 
and administrative structure, and their armies were easily a match for the other 
Greek powers. According to Scholten, the Aetolian League consisted of elites at 
the top, but was fundamentally a society of farmers and herders. The league had 
a federal structure consisting of a federal council in which the level of 
representation was proportional to the size of a community’s contribution to the 
league’s army, a popular assembly of all citizens which met twice a year, and an 
inner council equivalent to a federal government. It could raise armies and 
conduct foreign policy on a common basis. It also implemented economic 
standardization, levying taxes, using a common currency and adopting a uniform 
system of weights and measures.

 Origins of the 
League

It is uncertain when the League was founded. It has been suggested that it 
may have been founded by
Epaminondas
. Grainger believes it was founded 
much later – around the time of the rise of
Philip II of Macedon
. After Philip’s victory of
Chaeronea
Aetolia was granted
Naupaktos
which the Aetolians garrisoned – a 
level of organization that suggests some formal government rather than the loose 
alliance of earlier times.

 Alliance with Rome

The league was the first Greek ally of the
Roman Republic
, siding with the Romans during 
the
First Macedonian War
, and helping to defeat
Philip V of Macedon
at the
Battle of Cynoscephalae
in
197 BC
, during the
Second Macedonian War
. However, it grew 
increasingly hostile to Roman involvement in Greek affairs and only a few years 
later sided with
Antiochus III
, the anti-Roman king of the
Seleucid Empire
, during the
Roman-Syrian War
. The defeat of Antiochus in
189 BC
robbed the league of its principal 
foreign ally and made it impossible to stand alone in continued opposition to 
Rome. The league was forced to sign a peace treaty with Rome that made it a 
subject ally of the republic. Although it continued to exist in name, the power 
of the league was broken by the treaty and it never again constituted a 
significant political or military force.

 A Pirate State?

The Aetolian League acquired a reputation for piracy and brigandage. Though 
there is some recognition that Polybius was to an extent following an Achaean 
bias in his portrayal of the League thus, many modern historians have accepted 
this portrayal as in the main justified. For example, Walbank is explicit in 
seeing the Aetolians as systematically using piracy to supplement their income 
because of the meager resources of their region 
while Will simply assumes the truth of the charge. Grainger devotes a whole 
chapter to examining Aetolian involvement in piracy along with the charges that 
the Aetolians were temple robbers. He finds it hard to credit that Aetolia was 
involved in piracy given that Aetolia lacked a fleet of even the basic sort. 
Further by contrast with more general historians, those that have made specific 
studies of piracy and brigandage barely mention Aetolia. He lists the times that 
the Aetolians were accused of temple robbery and argues that the weight of these 
accusations should take into account that these are usually made by political 
opponents of the League and refer to occasions that were already some way in the 
past when the accusations were made.