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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;zumbly, post: 5126789, member: 57495&quot;]High on my want list has always been a coin with a portrait depicting not a deity or ruler, but instead, an ancient poet, philosopher, or mathematician.&nbsp; Mark Staal&#039;s website has <a href="http://ancientcoinage.org/poets-philosophers-astronomers-etc.html" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="http://ancientcoinage.org/poets-philosophers-astronomers-etc.html" rel="nofollow">a great page</a> with an extensive list of coins with such historical figures depicted, though unfortunately, many of these are extremely rare.&nbsp; I&#039;d been looking for one for years, and finally, a few weeks ago, I got my chance.&nbsp;&nbsp; A further enticement: it had not just one but <i>two </i>portraits, namely, those of Chrysippus the philosopher, and Aratus the poet.</p><p><br /></p><p>I&#039;m still a little embarrassed about my decidedly non-philosophical approach when I had to fight tooth and nail at Hammer Time to win it, but it was 4am, and I just really really wanted the coin. <img src="styles/default/xenforo/clear.png" class="mceSmilieSprite mceSmilie80" alt=":shame:" unselectable="on" unselectable="on" /> After I paid for my prize, I waited another week, and then did my new coin happy dance when it arrived in the mail.&nbsp; Though it&#039;s in pretty rough condition, both portraits remain fairly clear, and it&#039;s a type that doesn&#039;t come along every day, so, needless to say, I&#039;m glad to have it!&nbsp;&nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]1202948[/ATTACH]</p><p><b>CILICIA, Soloi-Pompeiopolis. Pseudo-autonomous issue. </b></p><p>AE26. 12.98g, 25.8mm. CILICIA, Soloi-Pompeiopolis, CY 229 (AD 163/4), time of Marcus Aurelius. SNG von Aulock 8712; RPC Online IV.3 temp 5840. O: Draped bust of Chrysippus right, touching beard with hand; ΘKΣ behind. R: ΠOMΠHEIOΠOΛEITΩN, draped bust of Aratus right, looking upward.</p><p><br /></p><p>Struck in Soloi in Cilicia, the coin celebrates two of the city&#039;s most famous sons.&nbsp; On the obverse is Chrysippus (279-206 BC), one of the ancient world&#039;s most important philosophers, who was known as the Second Founder of Stoicism.&nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>&quot;<i>If Chrysippus had not existed, neither would the Stoa,</i>&quot; wrote Diogenes Laertius in his <i>Lives of the Philosophers</i>, referring to the Stoic academy in Athens, where Chrysippus would serve as head, succeeding Zeno, the school&#039;s original founder, and Cleanthes, Chrysippus&#039;s teacher.&nbsp; Chrysippus was the main architect of the Stoic system of propositional logic, and of the more than 700 works he was said to have authored, about half of them were devoted to the topic.&nbsp; None of Chrysippus&#039;s texts have survived in full, but apparently hundreds of fragments exist, including at least two segments that have been found amongst the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herculaneum_papyri" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herculaneum_papyri" rel="nofollow">Herculaneum Papyri</a>.&nbsp;&nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>Later Stoics like Epictetus and Seneca were admirers of Chrysippus, as was that most philosophical of emperors, Marcus Aurelius.&nbsp; I&#039;m not sure if it was mere coincidence, but I do get a kick out of the fact that my coin - dated AD 163/4 by the civic year shown on it - was struck during Aurelius&#039;s reign.&nbsp; I also imagine that in Soloi, where he was born, Chrysippus&#039;s significance was probably the equivalent of Elvis&#039;s in Tupelo, Mississippi, so I&#039;m not surprised at all by the rock star treatment he gets on its coinage.&nbsp; His portrait on this one in particular is a classic - the quintessential bald and bearded Greek philosopher with a riveting gaze, one hand contemplatively stroking his beard.&nbsp; It was possibly even copied straight from an original Hellenistic era marble bust of Chrysippus. </p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]1202952[/ATTACH]</p><p><i><font size="4">Roman copy of a Hellenistic bust of Chrysippus (British Museum)</font></i></p><p><br /></p><p>It would be too much for this post to go into greater detail about Chrysippus&#039;s life and ideas, but if anyone is interested, I&#039;ll just leave a link to an excellent summary <a href="https://iep.utm.edu/chrysipp/" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://iep.utm.edu/chrysipp/" rel="nofollow">here</a>. </p><p><br /></p><p>Moving on to the other side of the coin, we have the poet Aratus, his head turned upwards towards the sky, a nod to his most famous work, <i>Phaenomena</i>, a poetic description of the constellations and other heavenly bodies.&nbsp; Now, if Chrysippus was the Elvis of Soli, then Aratus would be its Diplo...</p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]1202950[/ATTACH]</p><p><br /></p><p>Just for the record - I like Diplo, but he&#039;s no Elvis. <img src="styles/default/xenforo/clear.png" class="mceSmilieSprite mceSmilie8" alt=":D" unselectable="on" unselectable="on" /> As for Aratus, even though he was and is famous in his own right, to be honest, I knew nothing about him before this coin came along.&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>Born in Soloi around 315 BC, Aratus studied abroad in a number of different cities, including Ephesos, Kos, and Athens.&nbsp; His fame as a poet began in his lifetime, and grew to a level where invitations came from rulers such as Antigonus II Gonatas of Macedon and Antiochus I of Syria to write verses for them.&nbsp; At Antigonus&#039;s court, Aratus penned a celebration of the king&#039;s triumph over the Gauls in 277 BC, and it was also there that he produced <i>Phaenomena</i>, the poem that was to become his calling card for posterity.</p><p><br /></p><p>Despite the fact that it was essentially a rewrite of a 100-year-old text by the astronomer Eudoxus of Cnidus (that notably left uncorrected significant inaccuracies), <i>Phaenomena </i>proved to be hugely popular and enduringly influential.&nbsp; In the New Testament of the Bible (Acts 17:28), we see St. Paul, while addressing the Athenians, quoting a line - &quot;<i>For we are also his offspring</i>&quot; - directly from the at the time 300-year-old poem, knowing that the reference wouldn&#039;t be lost on his audience.&nbsp; It was also translated into Latin by no less than Cicero and (possibly) Germanicus.&nbsp; The poet Ovid, a particularly smitten fan, wrote of Aratus in his <i>Amores</i> (1.15): &quot;<i>While the sun and moon shine, Aratus will reflect their light</i>.&quot;</p><p><br /></p><p>With that last quote in mind, it seems fitting that today, we have a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aratus_(crater)" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aratus_(crater)" rel="nofollow">crater on the moon</a> as well as an asteroid (12152 Aratus) named after Aratus.&nbsp; And, of course, a really neat portrait on a coin!</p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]1202951[/ATTACH]</p><p><i><font size="4">Moon crater Aratus (Pic credit: <a href="http://lunarnetworks.blogspot.com/2010/11/slope-failure-near-aratus.html" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="http://lunarnetworks.blogspot.com/2010/11/slope-failure-near-aratus.html" rel="nofollow">Lunar Networks</a>) </font></i></p><p><br /></p><p>Thanks for reading, and please feel free to share anything related![/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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