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Message:: [QUOTE="DonnaML, post: 5140955, member: 110350"]I think the main problem is that the Wikipedia article is not a good source for supporting your argument. And that, regardless of the word's etymology, the term panthera was used by the Romans to refer to spotted big cats that were associated with Bacchus, but also existed in reality and were seen in the arena -- i.e., leopards (and occasionally  also cheetahs, because the Romans weren't necessarily clear on the distinction between the two). There's simply no good reason why we shouldn't translate the term panthera into its actual English equivalent when we see that animal on a coin. Always calling them panthers, even when the spots are obvious, is unnecessarily confusing, because panther has a different meaning in English than it did in the classical world. And because even the Romans used the term pardus, as a gendered subset of panthera. We're not talking about centaurs and pegasi and hippocamps here.  Should we stop calling hounds on coins by the term "hound" simply because those hounds weren't just "normal" dogs when portrayed accompanying Diana? Also, the fact is that many of the descriptions I see of the mosaics showing Bacchus/Dionysus with a "panther" actually do call the animal a leopard, because it's too obvious that that's what it is to ignore. Whereas it's easier to ignore what it really is on coins, the majority of which are too worn for people to be easily able to see the spots.[/QUOTE]