|
ARABIA FELIX – Under HIMYARITES
Scyphate Silver Unit 14mm (1.29 grams) Raydan mint, Struck circa 50-100 A.D.
Reference: Munro-Hay 3.2ai; SNG ANS 1575
Male head right; serpent torc around
Small head right; monogram and ‘scepter’ in fields, mint signature below.
You are bidding on the exact item pictured, provided with a Certificate of Authenticity and Lifetime Guarantee of Authenticity.
Arabia Felix – The Himyarite confederacy, which dominated Yemen from the 2nd Century B.C., was never brought under Roman control. However, because of the importance of the trade routes to India, friendly diplomatic relations were normally maintained. The Himyarite silver coinage, based on Athenian types, which hand been in issue for about a century continued in the time of Augustus with only minor modifications. Later, new types were introduced and the names of various rulers appear in a series which may extend down to the mid-2nd Century A.D.
The southwestern corner of the peninsula experienced more rainfall in ancient times and was thus much greener than the rest of the peninsula, enjoying more productive fields. The high peaks and slopes are capable of supporting significant vegetation and river beds called wadis help make other soil fertile. In 26 BC, Aelius Gallus under Augustus’ order led a military expedition to Arabia, but after some beginning successes he was obliged by the unhealthy climate and epidemic to desist in the conquest of the area.
Part of what led to Arabia Felix’s wealth and importance to the ancient world was its near monopoly of the trade in cinnamon and spices, both its native products and imports from India and the Horn of Africa. Strabo says that Arabia Felix was composed of five kingdoms, one each of warriors, farmers, “those who engage in the mechanical arts; another, the myrrh-bearing country, and another the frankincense-bearing country, although the same countries produce cassia, cinnamon, and nard.”
In the 1st century BC, the Arabian city of Eudaemon (usually identified with the port of Aden), in Arabia Felix, was a transshipping port in the Red Sea trade. It was described in the Periplus of the Erythraean Sea (probably 1st century AD) as if it had fallen on hard times. Of the auspiciously named port we read in the periplus that
Eudaemon Arabia was once a full-fledged city, when vessels from India did not go to Egypt and those of Egypt did not dare sail to places further on, but came only this far.
New developments in trade during the 1st century AD led to traders avoided the middlemen of Eudaemon and made the dangerous direct crossing of the Arabian Sea to the coast of India.
Arabia Felix is the title of the 1962 book by Danish novelist Thorkild Hansen, detailing a disastrous scientific expedition to the area led by Carsten Niebuhr lasting from 1761 to 1767. The veracity of certain aspects of the account have, however, been called into question.
|
