TAUROMENION in SICILY 305BC Rare Silver Ancient Greek Coin APOLLO TRIPOD i49066

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TAUROMENION in SICILY 305BC Rare Silver Ancient Greek Coin APOLLO TRIPOD i49066:
$1250.00

Item: i49066

Authentic Ancient Coin of:

Greek city of Tauromenion in Sicily
Silver 4 Litrai - Drachm 18mm(3.01 grams) Struck circa 305-295 B.C.
Reference: HGC 2, 1575; Sear 1010 var.; SNG ANS 5, nos. 1121-1123; BAR Issue 11
Laureate head of Apollo right; star behind.
TAYPOME-NITAN either side of tripod-lebes, terminating in lion\'s feet.

You are offerding on the exact item pictured, provided with a Certificate of Authenticity and Lifetime Guarantee of Authenticity.

In Greek and Roman mythology , Apollo, is one of the most important and diverse of the Olympian deities . The ideal of the kouros (a beardless youth), Apollo has been variously recognized as a god of light and the sun; truth and prophecy; archery ; medicine and healing; music, poetry, and the arts; and more. Apollo is the son of Zeus and Leto , and has a twin sister, the chaste huntress Artemis . Apollo is known in Greek-influenced Etruscan mythology as Apulu. Apollo was worshiped in both ancient Greek and Roman religion , as well as in the modern Greco -Roman Neopaganism .

As the patron of Delphi (Pythian Apollo), Apollo was an oracular god — the prophetic deity of the Delphic Oracle . Medicine and healing were associated with Apollo, whether through the god himself or mediated through his son Asclepius , yet Apollo was also seen as a god who could bring ill-health and deadly plague as well as one who had the ability to cure. Amongst the god\'s custodial charges, Apollo became associated with dominion over colonists , and as the patron defender of herds and flocks. As the leader of the Muses (Apollon Musagetes) and director of their choir, Apollo functioned as the patron god of music and poetry . Hermes created the lyre for him, and the instrument became a common attribute of Apollo. Hymns sung to Apollo were called paeans .

In Hellenistic times, especially during the third century BCE, as Apollo Helios he became identified among Greeks with Helios , god of the sun , and his sister Artemis similarly equated with Selene , goddess of the moon . In Latin texts, on the other hand, Joseph Fontenrose declared himself unable to find any conflation of Apollo with Sol among the Augustan poets of the first century, not even in the conjurations of Aeneas and Latinus in Aeneid XII (161–215). Apollo and Helios/Sol remained separate beings in literary and mythological texts until the third century CE.

A sacrificial tripod was a type of altar used by the ancient Greeks. The most famous was the Delphic tripod , on which the Pythian priestess took her seat to deliver the oracles of the deity. The seat was formed by a circular slab on the top of the tripod, on which a branch of laurel was deposited when it was unoccupied by the priestess. In this sense, by Classical times the tripod was sacred to Apollo . The mytheme of Heracles contesting with Apollo for the tripod appears in vase-paintings older than the oldest written literature. The oracle originally may have been related to the primal deity, the Earth.

Another well-known tripod was the Plataean Tripod , made from a tenth part of the spoils taken from the Persian army after the Battle of Plataea . This consisted of a golden basin, supported by a bronze serpent with three heads (or three serpents intertwined), with a list of the states that had taken part in the war inscribed on the coils of the serpent. The golden bowl was carried off by the Phocians during the Third Sacred War ; the stand was removed by the emperor Constantine to Constantinople (modern Istanbul ), where it still can be seen in the hippodrome , the Atmeydanı, although in damaged condition, the heads of the serpents disappeared however one is now on display at the nearby Istanbul Archaeology Museums. The inscription, however, has been restored almost entirely. Such tripods usually had three ears (rings which served as handles) and frequently had a central upright as support in addition to the three legs.

Tripods frequently are mentioned by Homer as prizes in athletic games and as complimentary gifts; in later times, highly decorated and bearing inscriptions, they served the same purpose. They also were used as dedicatory offerings to the deities, and in the dramatic contests at the Dionysia the victorious choregus (a wealthy citizen who bore the expense of equipping and training the chorus) received a crown and a tripod. He would either dedicate the tripod to some deity or set it upon the top of a marble structure erected in the form of a small circular temple in a street in Athens , called the street of tripods, from the large number of memorials of this kind. One of these, the Choragic Monument of Lysicrates , erected by him to commemorate his victory in a dramatic contest in 335 BC , still stands. The form of the victory tripod, now missing from the top of the Lysicrates monument, has been rendered variously by scholars since the eighteenth century.

The scholar Martin L. West writes that the sibyl at Delphi shows many traits of shamanistic practices, likely inherited or influenced from Central Asian practices. He cites her sitting in a cauldron on a tripod, while making her prophecies, her being in an ecstatic trance state, similar to shamans, and her utterings, unintelligible.

According to Herodotus (The Histories, I.144), the victory tripods were not to be taken from the temple sanctuary precinct, but left there for dedication.

Taormina (Sicilian: Taurmina, Greek : Ταυρομένιον Tauromenion, Latin : Tauromenium) is a comune and small town on the east coast of the island of Sicily , Italy , in the Province of Messina , about midway between Messina and Catania . Taormina has been a very popular tourist destination since the 19th century. It has popular beaches (accessible via an aerial tramway ) on the Ionian sea , which is remarkably warm and has a high salt content. Taormina can be reached via highways (autostrade) from Messina from the north and Catania from the south.

History Ancient

The area around Taormina was inhabited by the Siculi even before the Greeks arrived on the Sicilian coast in 734 BC to found a town called Naxos . The theory that Tauromenion was founded by colonists from Naxos is confirmed by Strabo and other ancient writers.

The new settlement seems to have risen rapidly to prosperity, and was apparently already a considerable town at the time of Timoleon \'s expedition in 345 BC. It was the first place in Sicily where that leader landed, having eluded the vigilance of the Carthaginians , who were guarding the Straits of Messina , and crossed direct from Rhegium (modern Reggio di Calabria ) to Tauromenium. The city was at that time still under the government of Andromachus, whose mild and equitable administration is said to have presented a strong contrast with that of the despots and tyrants of the other Sicilian cities. He welcomed Timoleon with open arms, and afforded him a secure resting place until he was enabled to carry out his plans in other parts of Sicily. Andromachus was not deprived of his position of power when all the other tyrants were expelled by Timoleon, but was permitted to retain it undisturbed till his death. (Marcellin. Vit. Thucyd. § 27.)

Little is recorded about Tauromenium for some time after this. It is probable that it passed under the authority of Agathocles , who drove the historian Timaeus into exile; and some time after this it was subject to a domestic despot of the name of Tyndarion , who was contemporary with Hicetas of Syracuse and Phintias of Agrigentum . Tyndarion was one of those who concurred in inviting Pyrrhus into Sicily (278 BC), and when that monarch landed with his army at Tauromenium, joined him with all his forces, and supported him in his march upon Syracuse . A few years later we find that Tauromenium had fallen into the power of Hieron of Syracuse , and was employed by him as a stronghold in the war against the Mamertines. (Id. p.497.) It was also one of the cities which was left under his dominion by the treaty concluded with him by the Romans in 263 BC.

Taormina as seen from the Saracen castle overlooking the town. The Greek amphitheatre is visible in the distance.

There is no doubt that Tauromenium continued to form a part of the kingdom of Syracuse until the death of Hieron, and that it only passed under the government of Rome when the whole island of Sicily was reduced to a Roman province; but we have scarcely any account of the part it took during the Second Punic War , though it would appear, from a hint in Appian ,[6] that it submitted to Marcellus on favorable terms; and it is probable that it was on that occasion it obtained the peculiarly favored position it enjoyed under the Roman dominion. For we learn from Cicero that Tauromenium was one of the three cities in Sicily which enjoyed the privileges of a civitas foederata or allied city, thus retaining a nominal independence, and was not even subject, like Messina, to the obligation of furnishing ships of war when called upon. The city, however, suffered severe calamities during the Servile War in Sicily (134–132 BC), having fallen into the hands of the insurgent slaves, who, on account of the great strength of its position, made it one of their chief posts, and were able for a long time to defy the arms of the consul Publius Rupilius . They held out until they were reduced to the most fearful extremities by famine, when the citadel was at length betrayed into the hands of the consul by one of their leaders named Sarapion , and the whole of the survivors put to the sword.

Tauromenium again played a conspicuous part during the wars of Sextus Pompeius in Sicily, and, from its strength as a fortress, was one of the principal points of the position which he took up in 36 BC, for defence against Octavian . It became the scene also of a sea-fight between a part of the fleet of Octavian, commanded by the triumvir in person, and that of Pompeius, which terminated in the defeat and almost total destruction of the former. In the settlement of Sicily after the defeat of Pompeius , Tauromenium was one of the places selected by Augustus to receive a Roman colony , probably as a measure of precaution, on account of the strength of its situation, as we are told that he expelled the former inhabitants to make room for his new colonists. Strabo speaks of it as one of the cities on the east coast of Sicily that was still subsisting in his time, though inferior in population both to Messana and Catana. Both Pliny and Ptolemy assign it the rank of a colonia, and it seems to have been one of the few cities of Sicily that continued under the Roman Empire to be a place of some consideration. Its territory was noted for the excellence of its wine, and produced also a kind of marble which seems to have been highly valued. Juvenal also speaks of the sea off its rocky coast as producing the choicest mullets. (Juv. v. 93.) The Itineraries place Tauromenium 32miles from Messina, and the same distance from Catania. (Itin. Ant. p.90; Tab. Peut. )

Middle ages and modern era

After the fall of the Western Roman Empire, Taormina continued to rank as one of the more important towns of Sicily, and because of the strength of its position was one of the last places that was retained by the Eastern Roman emperors ; but it was taken by the Arabs in 902 after a siege of two years. Taormina was renamed \"Al-Muizzia\" in honour of Imam al-Muizz, who was a Fatimid Caliph (reigned 953–75). Muslim rule of the town (see History of Islam in southern Italy ) lasted until 1078, when it was captured by the Norman count Roger I of Sicily .

After the fall of the Normans and of their heirs, the Hohenstaufen , Taormina followed the history of Sicily under the Angevins and then the Crown of Aragon . In 1410 King Martin II of Sicily was elected here by the Sicilian Parliament. Later Taormina was under Spanish suzerainty, receiving the status of \"city\" in the 17th century.

In 1675 it was besieged by the French, who had occupied Messina . Under the Bourbons dynasty of the Kingdom of Two Sicilies , Taormina did not have a relevant role; however, it obtained an easier access when part of the Catrabico promontory was partially cut and a seaside road connecting it to Messina and Catania was created. It received also a station on the second-oldest railroad in the region. Starting from the 19th century Taormina became a popular tourist resort in the whole of Europe: people who visited Taormina include Oscar Wilde , Nicholas I of Russia , Johann Wolfgang von Goethe , Nietzsche (who here wrote his Also sprach Zarathustra ), Richard Wagner and many others.

Contemporary age The Taormina coast

In the late 19th century Taormina gained further prominence as the place where Wilhelm von Gloeden worked most of his life as a photographer of predominantly male nudes . There is some speculation about Taormina being an early gentlemen\'s destination. Also credited for making Taormina popular was Otto Geleng , best known in his hometown of Berlin for his fine paintings, which he composed and painted in Italy but exhibited in Germany. What distinguishes Geleng, however, is his choice to depict the more southern regions where he captured the spectacular views and light of Sicily. He often painted the area\'s Greek colonial ruins, including Taormina. Taormina\'s first important tourist was Johann Wolfgang Goethe who dedicated exalting pages to the city in his book entitled Italian Journey , but perhaps it was Geleng’s views that made its beauty talked about throughout Europe and turned the site into a famous tourist center. The artist arrived in Sicily at the age of 20 in search of new subjects for his paintings. On his way through Taormina he was so enamoured by the landscape that he decided to stop for part of the winter. Geleng began to paint everything that Taormina offered: ruins, sea, mountains, none of which were familiar to the rest of Europe. When his paintings were later exhibited in Berlin and Paris, many critics accused Geleng of having an ‘unbridled imagination’. At that, Geleng challenged them all to go to Taormina with him, promising that he would pay everyone\'s expenses if he were not telling the truth.

During the early 20th century the town became a colony of expatriate artists, writers, and intellectuals. Albert Stopford grew roses in his Edwardian garden; D. H. Lawrence stayed at the Fontana Vecchia from 1920 to 1922. (He wrote a number of his poems, novels, short stories, and essays, and a travel book, Sea and Sardinia .) Thirty years later, from April 1950 through September 1951, the same villa was home to Truman Capote , who wrote of his stay in the essay \"Fontana Vecchia.\" Also Tennessee Williams , Jean Cocteau and Jean Marais visited the place.[16] Charles Webster Leadbeater , the theosophical author, found out that Taormina had the right magnetics fields for Jiddu Krishnamurti to develop his talents, so the young Krishnamurti dwelt here from time to time.[citation needed] Halldór Laxness , the Icelandic author and Nobel Prize winner , worked here on the first modern Icelandic novel, Vefarinn mikli frá Kasmír .

By this time Taormina had become \"a polite synonym for Sodom \" as Harold Acton described it. Later, however, after the Second World War Acton was visiting Taormina with Evelyn Waugh and, coming upon a board advertising “Ye Olde English Teas” he sighed and commented that Taormina \'was now quite as boring as Bournemouth\'.

Taormina viewed from the bay of Giardini Naxos Main sights Taormina panorama of the square Archaeology See also: Ancient theatre of Taormina

The present town of Taormina occupies the ancient site, on a lofty hill which forms the last projecting point of the mountain ridge that extends along the coast from Cape Pelorus to this point. The site of the old town is about 250 metres (820ft) above the sea, while a very steep and almost isolated rock, crowned by a Saracen castle, rises about 150 metres (490ft) higher: this is undoubtedly the site of the ancient Arx or citadel, the inaccessible position of which is repeatedly alluded to by ancient writers. Portions of the ancient walls may be traced at intervals all round the brow of the hill, the whole of the summit of which was evidently occupied by the ancient city. Numerous fragments of ancient buildings are scattered over its whole surface, including extensive reservoirs of water, sepulchres, tesselated pavements, etc., and the remains of a spacious edifice, commonly called a Naumachia , but the real purpose of which it is difficult to determine.

The Teatro Greco (\"Greek theatre\"). The courtyard of the 10th century Palazzo Corvaja The Duomo dates from the 13th century Casa Cipolla in Taormina dates from the 15th century

But by far the most remarkable monument remaining at Taormina is the Ancient theatre , which is one of the most celebrated ruins in Sicily, on account both of its remarkable preservation and its beautiful location. It is built for the most part of brick, and is therefore probably of Roman date, though the plan and arrangement are in accordance with those of Greek, rather than Roman, theatres; whence it is supposed that the present structure was rebuilt upon the foundations of an older theatre of the Greek period. With a diameter of 109 metres (358ft) (after an expansion in the 2nd century), this theatre is the second largest of its kind in Sicily (after that of Syracuse); it is frequently used for operatic and theatrical performances and for concerts. The greater part of the original seats have disappeared, but the wall which surrounded the whole cavea is preserved, and the proscenium with the back wall of the scena and its appendages, of which only traces remain in most ancient theatres, are here preserved in singular integrity, and contribute much to the picturesque effect, as well as to the interest, of the ruin. From the fragments of architectural decorations still extant we learn that it was of the Corinthian order , and richly ornamented. Some portions of a temple are also visible, converted into the church of San Pancrazio, but the edifice is of small size.

View of Mt. Etna erupting as seen from Taormina Others

Palazzo Corvaja (10th century)
Baroque fountain (1635)
Church of San Domenico
Anglican Church of Saint George

Culture and tourism

Just south of Taormina is the Isola Bella , a nature reserve ; and further south, situated beside a bay, is the popular seaside resort of Giardini Naxos . Tours of the Capo Sant\' Andrea grottos are also available.

The village of Taormina is perched on a cliff overlooking the Ionian sea. Besides the ancient Greek theatre, it has many old churches, lively bars, fine restaurants, and antique shops. Taormina is approximately a forty-five minute drive away from Europe\'s largest active volcano, Mount Etna .

Icelandic writer Halldór Laxness , who won the Nobel prize for literature in 1955, wrote most of his first novel, Vefarinn mikli frá Kasmír (\"The Great Weaver from Kashmir\"), in Taormina which he then praised highly in his book of autobiographical essays, Skáldatími (\"The Time of the Poet\", 1963).

Between 1948 and 1999 the English writer Daphne Phelps lived in the Casa Cuseni designed and built by Robert Hawthorn Kitson in 1905, and entertained various friends including Bertrand Russell , Roald Dahl , and Tennessee Williams .

The British songwriter Mark Knopfler evokes the town in his song \"Lights of Taormina\" extracted from his 2015 album Tracker

Events

Many exhibitions and events are organized during the summer in Taormina. The exceptional stage for pop and classical concerts, opera and important performances often recorded by television (for example, the ceremony of the Silver Ribbon Award, the Festivalbar, the Kore) is the Ancient Theatre. Since 1983, the most important performances are realized by Taormina Arte , the cultural institution which organizes one of the most famous music, theatre and dance festivals. Within the program of Taormina Arte there is the Taormina Film Fest , the well-known cinema festival, the heir of the Cinema Festival of Messina and Taormina, dating from 1960, which for about twenty years has hosted the David of Donatello Awards with the participation of the most famous Italian film stars. During the Taormina Film Fest the Silver Ribbons are now awarded, a prize created by Italian Film Journalists.

Since 2005, in October, Taormina Arte has organized the Giuseppe Sinopoli Festival, a festival dedicated completely to the great conductor, who died in 2001 and was for many years the artistic director of Taormina Arte.

Famous people

Tyndarion (278 BC) tyrant of Tauromenium
Francesco Buzzurro (born October 10, 1969) guitarist

Gallery Piazza IX Aprile Night-time in Taormina Taormina attracts tourists and visitors all year round One of the many antique shops in Taormina Exterior of Corvaja Palace A traversa in Taormina Taormina as seen from the Greek theater with Mt. Etna in the background. Greek-Roman theatre. Ruins of Greek Theatre at Taormina painting by Hungarian painter Tivadar Kosztka Csontváry (1904-1905)

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