Bronze Antiochus IV CSE PLATE COIN
$78.77 in Sept. 2001.
Contributed by nummohead 



Diademed and radiate head of Antiochus IV r. Border of dots./Zeus' Aegis
bearing the head of Medusa. BASILEWS ANTIOXOY QEOY EPIFANOYS. CSE 103 (THIS
COIN). ex Arthur Houghton collection. This is an extremely rare coin of
Antiochus IV, the infamous Seleucid king who tried to repress the Maccabees
in the Hannukah story. Antiochus was especially devoted to the cult of Zeus
and attempted to convert the Jewish temple into a temple of Zeus. The Aegis
(Zeus' special shield) on the reverse probably depicts an immense gold
aegis that the king gave to the people of Athens. It was erected on the
Acropolis, but a great wind storm later knocked it down. The image of the
so-called "beautiful Medusa" found on Seleucid coins is the distant
ancestor of the Medusa head that has become the corporate emblem of the
Versacci fashion empire. This is an ex Houghton coll. piece and the plate
coin for Coins of the Seleucid Empire, no. 103.