PENNY OF ANTIOCHUS IV FOUND IN JERUSALEM

A bronze penny minted by the Greek tyrant from the Hanukkah story was recently stumbled upon by archaeologists amid the ruins of Jerusalem’s Tower of David during routine cleaning of the site, the museum said in a statement Tuesday ahead of the commencement of the eight-day festival on Saturday night.

Orna Cohen, chief conservation officer at the iconic Jerusalem landmark, found the small bronze coin a few weeks ago during routine conservation work after a section of the Hasmonean-era city wall that runs through the citadel’s courtyard suffered minor damage (from either recent stormy weather or schoolchildren, nobody’s really sure).

The head of Antiochus IV Epiphanes appears on the front of the bronze penny, and the reverse has a goddess holding something — perhaps a torch — in her hand.

Antiochus IV was a Seleucid monarch remembered in Jewish history for his promotion of Hellenization and suppression of religious observances. While he was battling the rival Ptolemaic kingdom in Egypt for control of the Levant, Jewish zealots rose in revolt against Antiochus and the Hellenized high priest installed in the Jerusalem temple.

The coin’s precise date wasn’t clear, but thousands of others of the same type were minted at the port of Acre, then called Antiochia Ptolemais, between 172 and 168 BCE, during Antiochus IV Epiphanes’s reign.

Its serrated edge helped pinpoint it to a 50-year window when that style was in vogue among Seleucid kings.

“Acre seemed to like the idea of serrated coins,” IAA Coin Department head Donald Ariel told The Times of Israel.

The coin may have been struck by the Seleucid army to pay troops used to quell the Maccabee revolt, he said. Such coins were used as small change by soldiers in the employ of the Greeks.

To read the complete article, see:
Coin struck by vilified king from Hanukkah story found in Jerusalem (www.timesofisrael.com/coin-struck-by-vilified-king-from-hanukkah-story-found-in-jerusalem/)

To read the other articles, see:
Rare coin from King Antiochus’s rule discovered in Jerusalem (www.jpost.com/Israel-News/Rare-coin-from-King-Antiochuss-rule-discovered-in-Jerusalem-475963)
2,000-year-old coin from Maccabean revolt found in Jerusalem (www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_article.php?id=38875)

	NBS (coinbooks.org) Web