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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;Gavin Richardson, post: 2631564, member: 83956&quot;]Lovely coin, Valentinian. I had a Celator article about Atargatis/Dea Syria and her connection to a parodic moment in Apulieus&#039;s Golden Ass (aka Metamorphoses). Below is an excerpt. The article can be read here: <a href="https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/23980399/Celator%20Essay%20on%20Apuleius%20Richardson.pdf" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/23980399/Celator%20Essay%20on%20Apuleius%20Richardson.pdf" rel="nofollow">https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/23980399/Celator Essay on Apuleius Richardson.pdf</a></p><p><br /></p><p>“Perhaps due to religious syncretism involving Atargatis and Cybele, Antonine and Severan coinage often depicted the Great Mother goddess Cybele similarly seated, holding a tympanum with a lion at her feet. It is this association between Atargatis and her lions that is parodied most cleverly in [Apuleius’s] Metamorphoses. Instead of being borne in majesty by the noble lion, the cult statue of Atargatis is carried on the back of an ass. Numismatic reverse types offer insight into the joke since many coins depict Atargatis being carried on a lion’s back. The earliest such coin is a didrachm of Manbog, the pre-Hellenistic Syrian name for Hierapolis, likely struck sometime in the fourth century B.C.&nbsp; Later Roman provincial coins of Caracalla, Severus Alexander, Philip I, and Philip II would continue this iconographical tradition, depicting Atargatis riding a lion and holding a scepter.&nbsp; Similar Severan reverse types feature Cybele (or her North African equivalent “Dea Caelestis”) also riding a lion.&nbsp; Although these issues are slightly later than the probable composition date of the Metamorphoses, they testify to an iconographical tradition that likely informs the Apuleius text...&quot;[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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