I was watching the HBO series Rome, and saw this obviously fake looking coin being tossed from a part of the bribery that Herod was offering Antony, instantly that looked Ptolemaic to me, so I looked up on Herod's coinage and it looks like he didn't issue any gold, could he have simply payed them with the coins of Ptolemy Egypt?
Yeh, can't trust movies or television (or the news) for reliable ancient numismatics. There were no gold Judaean coins issued at all. The Romans would not allow the client kingdom to produce any coins with precious metal. The only times Judaea produced silver coinage was during the few years of the 1st Jewish War/Revolt, and again during the few years of the 2nd (Bar Kochba) Revolt. The fake/fantasy(?) coin pictured looks more like an issue of Tyre or Sidon than Alexandria. The right reverse legend is too out-of-focus for my old eyes to read. If Herod gave away gold, and if it was in the form of coins, and if it was Ptolemaic gold -- they would have been fairly old coins. I think the last of the Ptolemaic gold coinage were struck in late 3rd century BCE.
They always use fakes in Hollywood. In the film Gladiator Lucilla hands some fake gold coins to Maximus' servant.
