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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;dadams, post: 3072830, member: 82194&quot;]<font face="Times New Roman">Here is a little interesting coin I picked up back in 2017 out of one of [USER=42773]@John Anthony[/USER] &#039;s auctions that I haven&#039;t shown:</font></p><p><br /></p><p style="text-align: center"><img src="http://www.bibliopath.com/coins/ancient/Pontos_Mithridates-VI-Eupator_SNG-BM-Black-Sea-984-card.jpg" class="bbCodeImage wysiwygImage" alt="" unselectable="on" /></p> <p style="text-align: center"><br /></p><p><font face="Times New Roman">This coin is the only one depicting a comet in pre-Augustan times and is said to represent a comet that appeared in the constellation Pegasus for 70 days and which appeared in the year of the birth of Mithridates VI Eupator foretelling of his greatness.</font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman"><br /></font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman">There seems to be much scholarly conflict about the dates of the comets appearances as well as about the life of Mithridates himself, but I discovered a well thought out and presented article, <i>Mithridates, the Banner of Ch&#039;ih-Yu, and the Comet Coin</i> that clearly and concisely lays the ground work for identifying the years of these comets appearances.&nbsp; By studying the details revealed in Justin&#039;s&nbsp; <i><a href="http://www.forumromanum.org/literature/justin/english/index.html" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="http://www.forumromanum.org/literature/justin/english/index.html" rel="nofollow">Epitome of the Philippic History of Pompeius Trogus</a></i>, other ancient histories, the horse head (Pegasus)/comet coin and historical <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical_comet_observations_in_China" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical_comet_observations_in_China" rel="nofollow">Chinese comet observations</a> the author, <a href="http://John T. Ramsey" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="http://John T. Ramsey" rel="nofollow">John T. Ramsey</a>, concludes that the first comet appeared in the year 135 BC, marking the birth of Mithridates Eupator. The second comet is shown to have arrived in 119 BC, marking Mithridates&#039; official rule of Pontus (his mother ruled by Regency after the death of his father 123-119).</font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman"><br /></font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman">I&#039;m always in awe of the great essays many of you include with the presentation of your coins, but alas I suspect I&#039;ve devoted most of my allotted time in photoshop with my homage to [USER=81896]@Deacon Ray[/USER] </font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman"><br /></font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman">I have, of course, just barely scratched the surface of the wealth of information this coin points to but I am happy to have learned a smidge about the history of Mithridates the Great.</font></p><p><br /></p><p><font face="Times New Roman">If you are interested in reading the article mentioned above shoot me a PM.</font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman"><br /></font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman">I do also recommend reading the Wikipedia pages for <font face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mithridates_VI_of_Pontus" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mithridates_VI_of_Pontus" rel="nofollow">Mithridates VI of Pontus</a> and the pages linked to the <font face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mithridatic_Wars" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mithridatic_Wars" rel="nofollow">Mithridatic Wars</a>.</font></font></font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman"><br /></font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman">I&#039;d love to see all those coins of Pontus</font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman"><br /></font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman">Edited to add: or is it Pontos??</font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman"><br /></font></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><font face="Times New Roman"><br /></font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman"><br /></font></p><p><font face="Times New Roman"></font>[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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