Just in Time for Hanukkah, a Coin with Its Villain’s Face Is Discovered https://mosaicmagazine.com/picks/arts-culture/2022/11/just-in-time-for-hanukkah-a-coin-with-its-villains-face-is-discovered/

November 28, 2022 | Michael Horovitz
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In a recent search of the house of an individual suspected of stealing archaeological artifacts, Israeli authorities found a 2nd-century BCE bronze coin bearing a likeness of King Antiochus IV. Michael Horovitz writes:

Antiochus IV was a Seleucid monarch remembered in Jewish history for his promotion of Hellenization and suppression of religious observances. While he was battling the rival Ptolemaic kingdom in Egypt for control of the Levant, Jewish zealots rose in revolt against Antiochus and the Hellenized high priest installed in Jerusalem’s Second Temple.

Antiochus returned from Egypt and attempted to quell the uprising. After his death on a subsequent campaign in Persia, Hasmonean rebels led by Judah Maccabee and his clansmen succeeded in wresting control of Judea from the Seleucid Greeks, restoring the Temple and forming a Jewish kingdom that ruled for a century. The Hanukkah holiday celebrates the Maccabees’ victory over the Greeks and Hellenized Jews.

According to [the numismatist] Danny Synon, what is unique about the currency series that the bronze Antiochus IV coin is part of is that it was minted during what he calls an “economic experiment” conducted by the monarch in which he allowed four municipalities to mint their own local coinage. One side of the “municipality coin” usually featured a local god, said Synon, and the other side was engraved with an image connected to the local area. In the case of the recently recovered coin, one side features the king, and the other shows a ship and the name of the port city of Tyre.

Read more on Times of Israel: https://www.timesofisrael.com/looted-coin-of-hanukkah-villain-found-during-bust-of-suspected-artifact-thief/