Sardes in Asia Minor 133BC Rare Ancient Greek Coin Apollo Club i31472

Item: i31472

 Authentic Ancient

Coin of:

Greek City of Sardes in Asia Minor

Bronze 15mm (4.72 grams) Struck 133-80 B.C.
Reference: Sear 4736; B.M.C. 22.239,18
Laureate head of Apollo right.
ΣΑΡΔΙ /ΑΝΩΝ either side of club, monogram to right; all within oak-wreath.

The ancient capital of the Lydian Kings, Sardeis lay under a

fortified hill in the Hermos valley, at the important road junction. In the

pre-Alexandrian age it was the center of the principal Persian satrapy, ad in

all probability the mint-place of much of the Persian imperial coinage of darics

and sigloi. In 189 B.C. it came under the rule of the Attalids of Pergamon, and

fifty-six years later it passes to the Romans.

You are bidding on the exact item pictured,

Authenticity.

In

Greek

and

Roman mythology

, Apollo
,

is one of the most important and diverse of the

Olympian deities

. The ideal of the

kouros
(a

beardless youth), Apollo has been variously recognized as a god of light and the

sun; truth and prophecy;

archery
;

medicine and healing; music, poetry, and the arts; and more. Apollo is the son

of Zeus
and

Leto, and has a

twin

sister, the chaste huntress

Artemis
.

Apollo is known in Greek-influenced

Etruscan mythology

as Apulu. Apollo was worshiped in both

ancient Greek

and

Roman religion

, as well as in the modern

Greco

–Roman

Neopaganism

.

As the patron of Delphi

(Pythian Apollo), Apollo was an

oracular

god — the prophetic deity of the

Delphic Oracle
.

Medicine and healing were associated with Apollo, whether through the god

himself or mediated through his son

Asclepius
,

yet Apollo was also seen as a god who could bring ill-health and deadly

plague

as well as one who had the ability to cure. Amongst the god’s

custodial charges, Apollo became associated with dominion over

colonists

, and as the patron defender of herds and flocks. As the leader of

the Muses
(Apollon

Musagetes) and director of their choir, Apollo functioned as the patron god

of music and poetry
.

Hermes
created

the lyre
for him,

and the instrument became a common

attribute

of Apollo. Hymns sung to Apollo were called

paeans
.

In Hellenistic times, especially during the third century BCE, as Apollo

Helios he became identified among Greeks with

Helios
,

god of

the sun
, and his sister Artemis similarly equated with

Selene
,

goddess

of the moon
.

In Latin texts, on the other hand, Joseph Fontenrose declared himself unable to

find any conflation of Apollo with

Sol

among the

Augustan poets

of the first century, not even in the conjurations of

Aeneas
and

Latinus
in

Aeneid
XII

(161–215).

Apollo and Helios/Sol remained separate beings in literary and mythological

texts until the third century CE.

Sardis, also Sardes (Lydian:

Sfard,

Greek

: Σάρδεις,

Persian

: Sparda), modern Sart in the

Manisa
province

of Turkey
, was

the capital of the ancient kingdom of

Lydia
, one of the

important cities of the

Persian Empire

, the seat of a

proconsul

under the

Roman

Empire
, and the metropolis of the province Lydia in later Roman and

Byzantine

times. As one of the

Seven churches of Asia

, it was addressed by the author of the

Book of Revelation

in terms which seem to imply that its population was

notoriously soft and fainthearted. Its importance was due, first to its military

strength, secondly to its situation on an important highway leading from the

interior to the

Aegean

coast, and thirdly to its commanding the wide and fertile plain of the Hermus.

//

 Geography

Sardis was situated in the middle of

Hermus

valley, at the foot of

Mount Tmolus

, a steep and lofty spur which formed the citadel. It was about

4 kilometres (2.5 mi) south of the Hermus. Today, the site is located by the

present day village of Sart, near

Salihli
in

the Manisa province of Turkey, close to the

Ankara
–

İzmir
highway

(approximately 72 kilometres (45 mi) from

İzmir
). The part

of remains including the bath-gymnasium complex, synagogue and Byzantine shops

is open to visitors year-round.

 History

The earliest reference to Sardis is in the

Persians
of

Aeschylus

(472 BC); in the Iliad

the name Hyde seems to be given to the city of the

Maeonian

(i.e. Lydian) chiefs, and in later times Hyde was said to be the

older name of Sardis, or the name of its citadel. It is, however, more probable

that Sardis was not the original capital of the Maeonians, but that it became so

amid the changes which produced the powerful Lydian empire of the 8th century

BC.

The city was captured by the

Cimmerians

in the 7th century, by the

Persians

and by the

Athenians
in

the 6th, and by

Antiochus III the Great

at the end of the 3rd century. In the Persian era

Sardis was conquered by

Cyrus the Great

and formed the end station for the Persian

Royal Road

which began in

Persepolis
,

capital of

Persia

. During the

Ionian Revolt

, the

Athenians

burnt down the city. Sardis remained under Persian domination

until it surrendered to

Alexander the Great

in 334 B.C..

Once at least, under the emperor

Tiberius
,

in 17 AD, it was destroyed by an earthquake; but it was always rebuilt. It was

one of the great cities of western

Asia Minor

until the later Byzantine period.

The early Lydian kingdom was far advanced in the industrial arts and Sardis

was the chief seat of its manufactures. The most important of these trades was

the manufacture and dyeing of delicate woolen stuffs and carpets. The stream

Pactolus

which flowed through the market-place “carried golden sands” in early antiquity,

in reality gold dust out of Mt. Tmolus; later, trade and the organization of

commerce continued to be sources of great wealth. After

Constantinople

became the capital of the East, a new road system grew up

connecting the provinces with the capital. Sardis then lay rather apart from the

great lines of communication and lost some of its importance. It still, however,

retained its titular supremacy and continued to be the seat of the

metropolitan bishop

of the province of Lydia, formed in 295 AD. It is

enumerated as third, after

Ephesus
and

Smyrna
, in the

list of cities of the

Thracesion

thema

given by

Constantine Porphyrogenitus

in the 10th century; but over the next four

centuries it is in the shadow of the provinces of Magnesia-upon-Sipylum and

Philadelphia, which retained their importance in the region.

After 1071 the Hermus valley began to suffer from the inroads of the

Seljuk Turks

but the successes of the general

Philokales

in 1118 relieved the district and the ability of the

Comneni

dynasty together with the gradual decay of the

Seljuk Sultanate of Rum

retained it under Byzantine dominion. When

Constantinople

was taken by the

Venetians

and Franks

in 1204 Sardis came under the rule of the Byzantine

Empire of Nicea

. However once the Byzantines retook Constantinople in 1261,

Sardis with the entire

Asia Minor

was neglected and the region eventually fell under the control of

Ghazi (Ghazw)

emirs, the

Cayster

valleys and a fort on the citadel of Sardis was handed over to them

by treaty in 1306. The city continued its decline until its capture (and

probable destruction) by the

Mongol

warlord Timur

in 1402.

 Archaeological

expeditions

By the nineteenth century, Sardis was in ruins, showing construction chiefly

of the Roman period. The first large scale archaeological expedition in Sardis

was directed by a

Princeton University

team between years 1910 – 1914, unearthing the Temple

of Artemis, and more than a thousand Lydian tombs. The excavation campaign was

halted by World War I

, followed by the

Turkish War of Independence

. Some surviving artifacts from the Butler

excavation were added to the collection of the

Metropolitan Museum of Art

in

New York
.

The excavation is currently under the directorship of Nick Cahill, professor

at the

University of Wisconsin–Madison

. 4^[citation

needed]The laws governing archaeological expeditions in Turkey

ensure that all archaeological artifacts remain in Turkey. Some of the important

finds from the site of Sardis are housed in the

Archaeological Museum of Manisa

, including Late Roman mosaics and sculpture,

a helmet from the mid-6th century BC, and pottery from various periods.

 Sardis

synagogue

Since 1958, both

Harvard

and

Cornell Universities

have sponsored annual archeological expeditions to

Sardis. These excavations unearthed perhaps the most impressive synagogue in the

western diaspora yet discovered from antiquity, yielding over eighty Greek and

seven Hebrew inscriptions as well as numerous mosaic floors. (For evidence in

the east, see

Dura Europos

in Syria

.) The discovery of the Sardis synagogue has reversed previous

assumptions about Judaism in the later Roman empire. Along with the discovery of

the godfearers

/theosebeis inscription from the

Aphrodisias

, it provides indisputable evidence for the continued vitality of

Jewish communities in Asia Minor, their integration into general Roman imperial

civic life, and their size and importance at a time when many scholars

previously assumed that Christianity had eclipsed Judaism.^[

neededcitation]

The synagogue was a section of a large bath-gymnasium complex, that was in

use for about 450 – 500 years. In the beginning, middle of the second century

AD, the rooms the synagogue is situated in were used as changing rooms or

resting rooms. The complex was destroyed in 616 AD by the Sassanian-Persians.^[

neededcitation]