Contents
3 Mati Johananoff: From Sidon to Samaria: Fourth-Century BCE Autonomous Coins of Samaria with Sidonian Motifs
35 Eric A. Carlen: The Ptolemaic Uncertain Era Coinage of 262 BCE: The Transition from ΣΩΤΗΡΟΣ to ΒΑΣΙΛΕΩΣ
59 Héloïse Aumaître and Catharine C. Lorber: New Evidence Concerning a Mint Imitating Ptolemaic Tetradrachms
89 David Jeselsohn: The Antiochus VII–John Hyrcanus Coins of Jerusalem
95 Barbara Lichocka: A Coin Mold from the Israel Museum Collection: Ancient Original for Casting Fakes or a Modern Fake for ‘Ancient’ Casts?
115 Michalina Dzwoniarek-Konieczna: A Petrographic Analysis of the Israel Museum Coin Mold
125 Danny Syon and Yotam Tepper: A Hoard of Syrian Tetradrachms from a Mass Burial in ‘Akko-Ptolemais
143 Haim Gitler and Oren Tal: The Medium and Small Bronze Series of Bar Kokhba Reconsidered: More on a Mint at Herodium
163 Dvir Raviv: The Distribution of Bar Kokhba Coins in the Northern Judean Hills: an Update
171 Yoav Farhi and Boris Bessarabov: From Byblos to Neapolis: A Reattribution of a Group of Provincial Tetradrachms of Caracalla
197 Ronit Palistrant Shaick: Myth in Service of Power: Why the Greek Hero Diomedes Appears on the Roman Coins of Tyre
213 Andrew Oddy and Stephen Mansfield: The ‘Neapolis’ Mint and the Cypriot Coinage of Heraclius
243 David Woods: A Note on the Arab-Byzantine Dodecanummium Struck in the Name of ‘Abd al-‘Azīz ibn Marwān
255 David J. Wasserstein: A Mold for Gold or Silver Coins of the ‘Abbāsid Caliph al-Rāḍī: Caliphal Legitimacy, the Ḥamdānids and the Roots of Ikhshīdid Policy in Palestine and Syria
Abstracts
3 Mati Johananoff: From Sidon to Samaria: Fourth-Century BCE Autonomous Coins of Samaria with Sidonian Motifs Roughly 10% of fourth century BCE Samarian coin types display Sidonian coin motifs. Similarities between Sidonian-styled Samarian coins and Phoenician coins have caused misclassifications, which are addressed in this paper. Eight new types of Sidonian-styled Samarian coins are defined. The origin and meanings of the adopted motifs are considered. The historical context of Sidonian-styled issues in relation to the political character of Samaria and Sidon during the fourth century BCE is discussed.
35 Eric A. Carlen: The Ptolemaic Uncertain Era Coinage of 262 BCE: The Transition from ΣΩΤΗΡΟΣ to ΒΑΣΙΛΕΩΣ The dated Ptolemaic silver coinage described as of an ‘uncertain era’ consists of three series of issues, the first two consisting of almost entirely of tetradrachms inscribed ΠΤΟΛΕΜΑΙΟΥ ΣΩΤΗΡΟΣ while the third consists almost entirely of didrachms inscribed ΠΤΟΛΕΜΑΙΟΥ ΒΑΣΙΛΕΩΣ. I show that the third series is the direct continuation of the second series on the basis of new didrachms that completely close what had appeared to be a nine-year gap between them. The circumstances that connect the two series in this way provide a new perspective on the second series’ purpose.
59 Héloïse Aumaître and Catharine C. Lorber: New Evidence Concerning a Mint Imitating Ptolemaic Tetradrachms New hoard evidence and a die study allow for the reassessment of a single mint that extensively produced imitative Ptolemaic tetradrachms. Besides the long-known imitations of dated tetradrachms of ‘Akko-Ptolemais from the reign of Ptolemy II, it also minted less familiar imitations, mainly of selected Alexandrian portrait tetradrachms of Ptolemy I. This imitative mint apparently began its activity during the Fourth or Fifth Syrian War and continued in the first decades of the second century BCE, perhaps c. 170‒169. In all likelihood located in Ammanitis, it probably operated under the authority of members of the Tobiad family.
89 David Jeselsohn: The Antiochus VII–John Hyrcanus Coins of Jerusalem This note summarizes what is known at present about the coins minted in Jerusalem in the last years of the reign of Antiochus VII Sidetes. A (unique?) coin with a new date, SE 183=130/129 BCE, is presented and a possible minting distribution of this series during the time span 132–129 BCE is discussed. All this is historically and numismatically important because it stands at the beginning of Hasmonean full autonomy and at the beginning of Hasmonean coin minting.
95 Barbara Lichocka: A Coin Mold from the Israel Museum Collection: Ancient Original for Casting Fakes or a Modern Fake for ‘Ancient’ Casts? A casting mold in the collection of the Israel Museum (IM 2017.46.37389), preserved in two parts was one of the items displayed to the public during the first temporary numismatic exhibition named The Production of Coins in Antiquity. The provenance of the mold remains unknown. Imprints of Alexandrian coin types issued under Nero and Hadrian suggest an
Egyptian origin. However, certain features of the object raise doubts about its age, and whether it had ever been used.
115 Michalina Dzwoniarek-Konieczna: A Petrographic Analysis of the Israel Museum Coin Mold Presented here are the results of a petrographic analysis of a small sample from a fragment of a coin-casting mold in the Israel Museum collection (IM 2017.46.37389). The aim of the study was to characterize the raw material from which the object is made and attempt to
indicate the artifact’s possible provenance. Our analyses have shown that the object is made of gypsum mortar with an addition of carbonates — lime (with terra rossa clasts) and almost monomineral aggregates of quartz. This type of raw material is common in the Mediterranean region, especially in its eastern part.
125 Danny Syon and Yotam Tepper: A Hoard of Syrian Tetradrachms from a Mass Burial in ‘Akko-Ptolemais Forty-six silver tetradrachms, 44 of them forming a hoard, were discovered in the unusual context of a mass grave, in the Roman-period cemetery in the colony of ‘Akko-Ptolemais. The coins range from Nero to Hadrian, with a terminus post quem for the hoard’s deposition in 119 CE. We argue that previous attempts to connect the hoard to the Bar Kokhba revolt are untenable, and suggest several possible scenarios for its deposition, none of them provable.
143 Haim Gitler and Oren Tal: The Medium and Small Bronze Series of Bar Kokhba Reconsidered: More on a Mint at Herodium Herodium was a major administrative center of the Bar Kokhba uprising and as such several of the insurgents’ issues may have been minted there. This article uses the two main die comparison studies for the Bar Kokhba medium- and small-size bronze series, namely the groundbreaking corpus of the Herodium hoard published by Spijkerman (1972) and Mildenberg’s seminal work, The Coinage of the Bar Kokhba War (1984) to examine the probability that a mint at Herodium may have produced most of these bronze coins.
163 Dvir Raviv: The Distribution of Bar Kokhba Coins in the Northern Judean Hills: an Update
171 Yoav Farhi and Boris Bessarabov: From Byblos to Neapolis: A Reattribution of a Group of Provincial Tetradrachms of Caracalla
197 Ronit Palistrant Shaick: Myth in Service of Power: Why the Greek Hero Diomedes Appears on the Roman Coins of Tyre
213 Andrew Oddy and Stephen Mansfield: The ‘Neapolis’ Mint and the Cypriot Coinage of Heraclius
243 David Woods: A Note on the Arab-Byzantine Dodecanummium Struck in the Name of ‘Abd al-‘Azīz ibn Marwān
255 David J. Wasserstein: A Mold for Gold or Silver Coins of the ‘Abbāsid Caliph al-Rāḍī: Caliphal Legitimacy, the Ḥamdānids and the Roots of Ikhshīdid Policy in Palestine and Syria
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