|
Greek city of Trikka in Thessaly
Silver Hemidrachm 17mm Struck circa 440-400 B.C.
Reference: Sear 2226; HGC 4, 311; Weber 2933; Dewing 1421 |
Certification: NGC Ancients
VF 6156184-015
Naked Thessalian youth, possibly Hero Thessalos, standing right, restraining forepart of unruly bull prancing right.
TRIKKAIΩN (partly retrograde), Forepart of hores prancing right; all within incuse square.
A center for the worship of Asclepius, Trikka was named after a daughter of the river-god Peneios.
You are bidding on the exact item pictured, provided with a Certificate of Authenticity and Lifetime Guarantee of Authenticity.
Trikala is a city in northwestern Thessaly, Greece. It is the capital of the Trikala Prefecture, and is located NW of Athens, NW of Karditsa, E of Ioannina and Metsovo, S of Grevena, SW of Thessaloniki, and W of Larissa.
Located in the fertile plain of Thessaly in central Greece, modern Trikala is the Homeric Trikka (or Trikki), the birthplace of three of the Argonauts and one of the areas touted as the birthplace of Asclepius (Asklepios), who is more often said to have been born at Epidaurus, where his main temple was sited in antiquity. Ruins of an old sanctuary to the physician-god, an Asklepieion, or healing place, are located between the central square and the church of Saint Nicholas (Agios Nikolaos) in Trikala; it is the oldest Aesculapium of Greece – a kind of medical centre, from which the worship of Aesculapius gradually spread.
There are other late Hellenistic and Roman period remains to be seen, mosaic floors, a stoa, and baths. Dominated by its Byzantine fortress on Hellenistic foundations occupying the ancient Acropolis, the picturesque city is divided in two by the river Lithaios, with the churches of Agios Demetrios and Agii Anargyri lending more Byzantine character to the modern town. She was managed by First Bulgarian Empire (920-922, 977-983, 996-997) due to occupations by Simeon I and Samuil. She was part of Great Wallachia (1204-1215), Despotate of Epirus (1215-1335), Despotate of Thessaly, who was a branch of one of Epirus, (1230-1335) (Suzerenity of Second Bulgarian Empire between 1230-1241, Nicean Empire between 1241-1261 and Byzantine Empire between 1261-1335), Serbian Empire (1348-1373), Byzantine Empire (1335-1348, 1373-1394, 1403-1411) and Ottoman Empire (1394-1403 and 1411-1881). Trikala was ceded to Greece in 1881 after the Treaty of Berlin. It was captured again by Ottomans during the Greco-Turkish War of 1897 on April 28 for six months. During the Principality of Pindus the national assembly of this state sat in Trikala.
Ruins of the Asclepeion.
Thessaly was home to extensive Neolithic and Chalcolithic cultures around 6000-2500 BC (see Cardium Pottery, Dimini and Sesklo). Mycenaean settlements have also been discovered, for example at the sites of Iolcos, Dimini and Sesklo (near Volos). In Archaic and Classical times, the lowlands of Thessaly became the home of baronial families, such as the Aleuadae of Larissa or the Scopads of Crannon. In the 4th century BC Jason of Pherae transformed the region into a significant military power, recalling the glory of Early Archaic times. Shortly after, Philip II of Macedon was appointed Archon of Thessaly, and Thessaly was thereafter associated with the Macedonian Kingdom for the next centuries. Thessaly later became part of the Roman Empire as part of the province of Macedonia.
|
