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<p>[QUOTE="NewStyleKing, post: 4511515, member: 106483"]These two figures represent not just the guardians of the cities,</p><p>7</p><p> but their saviours. These basic patterns of elaborate ‘portraits’ of deities, full figure depictions,and concentration on specific local cult or association with the issuing city are repeated on almost 40 coinages, that all seem to begin in or after the decade 170-160 BC (see Table 1).</p><p> </p><p> </p><p> CIVIC COIN DESIGN IN THE SECOND CENTURY BC</p><p>There are, of course, differences among these issues. Some have wreaths on the reverse, some do not; some have gods on the reverse, some do not; some have legends naming the gods, others do not. And there has been a tendency in past examinations of these types to break them down by such typological distinctions.</p><p>8</p><p> As a result, there has been little attempt to consider this group of coins as whole.However, they all share obvious technical characteristics such as spread or hammered flans, or at least dies that are smaller than the flans on which they are used;</p><p>9</p><p> their Attic weight standard; increased elaboration in the ‘portraiture’ of the obverse; and a tendency to frame reverse types with wreaths or legends. And almost all of the coins that can be reasonably firmly dated by hoard evidence seem to belong between c. 175 and 140 BC, that is to say within a generation.</p><p>10</p><p> There is, clearly, a danger that if we artificially break these coinages down into groups on the basis of certain design features we miss a broad, sweeping transformation that has its roots much deeper than the choices of those design features.But while we may be able to identify a broad movement that extends from mainland Greece through Thrace to Western Asia Minor, it is equally clear that the design decisions taken are fundamentally local. In this respect, I think, they exemplify a tension visible elsewhere in this volume between explanations that may be universally applicable for coin design choices, and those that focus on the individual circumstances of the issuing state. It is a tension we also see in the distinction articulated in a famous passage of Plato’s</p><p>Laws</p><p>, where the philosopher proposes that we may distinguish coinage that is ‘Hellenic’, use able ‘internationally’ in the Greek world (Ἑλληνικὸν νόμισμα ἕνεκά τε στρατειῶν καὶ ἀποδημιῶνεἰς τοὺς ἄλλους ἀνθρώπους) from that which is ‘epichoric’ (τὸ ἐπιχώριον),designed for local use only.</p><p>11</p><p> So to investigate the Great Transformation that I have just outlined in these civic coinages, we need to keep one eye on the local and one eye on the more general historical circumstances behind them. To begin with I want to take a look at some of the local circumstances in cases where there seems to be some surviving epigraphic and literary evidence.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>
[QUOTE="NewStyleKing, post: 4511515, member: 106483"]These two figures represent not just the guardians of the cities, 7 but their saviours. These basic patterns of elaborate ‘portraits’ of deities, full figure depictions,and concentration on specific local cult or association with the issuing city are repeated on almost 40 coinages, that all seem to begin in or after the decade 170-160 BC (see Table 1). CIVIC COIN DESIGN IN THE SECOND CENTURY BC There are, of course, differences among these issues. Some have wreaths on the reverse, some do not; some have gods on the reverse, some do not; some have legends naming the gods, others do not. And there has been a tendency in past examinations of these types to break them down by such typological distinctions. 8 As a result, there has been little attempt to consider this group of coins as whole.However, they all share obvious technical characteristics such as spread or hammered flans, or at least dies that are smaller than the flans on which they are used; 9 their Attic weight standard; increased elaboration in the ‘portraiture’ of the obverse; and a tendency to frame reverse types with wreaths or legends. And almost all of the coins that can be reasonably firmly dated by hoard evidence seem to belong between c. 175 and 140 BC, that is to say within a generation. 10 There is, clearly, a danger that if we artificially break these coinages down into groups on the basis of certain design features we miss a broad, sweeping transformation that has its roots much deeper than the choices of those design features.But while we may be able to identify a broad movement that extends from mainland Greece through Thrace to Western Asia Minor, it is equally clear that the design decisions taken are fundamentally local. In this respect, I think, they exemplify a tension visible elsewhere in this volume between explanations that may be universally applicable for coin design choices, and those that focus on the individual circumstances of the issuing state. It is a tension we also see in the distinction articulated in a famous passage of Plato’s Laws , where the philosopher proposes that we may distinguish coinage that is ‘Hellenic’, use able ‘internationally’ in the Greek world (Ἑλληνικὸν νόμισμα ἕνεκά τε στρατειῶν καὶ ἀποδημιῶνεἰς τοὺς ἄλλους ἀνθρώπους) from that which is ‘epichoric’ (τὸ ἐπιχώριον),designed for local use only. 11 So to investigate the Great Transformation that I have just outlined in these civic coinages, we need to keep one eye on the local and one eye on the more general historical circumstances behind them. To begin with I want to take a look at some of the local circumstances in cases where there seems to be some surviving epigraphic and literary evidence.[/QUOTE]
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