Thasos Silver Ancient Greek Coin Nude Satyr - Pan & Dionysus companion i40634
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Thasos Silver Ancient Greek Coin Nude Satyr - Pan & Dionysus companion i40634:
$657.77
Item: i40634
Authentic Ancient Coin of:
Greek city of Thasos on Island in the Thracian Sea
Silver Trihemiobol 12mm (0.82 grams) Struck 411-350 B.C.
Reference: B.M.C. 3.53-6; Sear 1755; SNG Cop II 1031
Satyr kneeling left, holding kantharos.
ΘAΣ / IΩN either side of amphora; all within incuse square.
* Numismatic Note: Nymphs were female spirits associated with a particular location: depending on the area, this included mountains, groves, springs, rivers, woods, valleys, and grottoes. Often these nymphs were involved with the gods, and they are frequently companioned with Artemis, Apollo, Dionysos, and the rustic Pan and Hermes. Often in mythology, the eponymous founder of a city or town becomes married to a local nymph. Occasionally, nymphs accompanied Dionysos and formed part of the Thiasos, or ecstatic retinue which included mainads, or female devotees of the god, whose actions included wild orgiastic trances and the consumption of raw flesh. Dionysos was also attended by satyrs, goat-men, who constantly attempted to engage the mainads in sexual intercourse.
You are offerding on the exact item pictured, provided with a Certificate of Authenticity and Lifetime Guarantee of Authenticity.
A kantharos (Greek κάνθαρος) or cantharus is a type of Greek pottery used for drinking. It is characterized by its high swung handles which extend above the lip of the pot.
The god Dionysus had a kantharos which was never empty.
Geometric kantharosIn Greek mythology, a satyr is one of a troop of male companions of Pan and Dionysus with goat-like (caprine) features, including a goat-tail, goat-like ears, and sometimes a goat-like phallus. In Roman Mythology there is a similar concept with goat-like features, the faun being half-man, half-goat. Greek-speaking Romans often use the Greek term saturos when referring to the Latin faunus, and eventually syncretize the two. The female \"Satyresses\" were a late invention of poets — that roamed the woods and mountains. In myths they are often associated with pipe-playing.
The satyrs\' chief was Silenus, a minor deity associated (like Hermes and Priapus) with fertility. These characters can be found in the only complete remaining satyr play, Cyclops, by Euripides, and the fragments of Sophocles\' Ichneutae (Tracking Satyrs). The satyr play was a short, lighthearted tailpiece performed after each trilogy of tragedies in Athenian festivals honoring Dionysus. There is not enough evidence to determine whether the satyr play regularly drew on the same myths as those dramatized in the tragedies that preceded. The groundbreaking tragic playwright Aeschylus is said to have been especially loved for his satyr plays, but none of them have survived.
Attic painted vases depict mature satyrs as being strongly built with flat noses, large pointed ears, long curly hair, and full beards, with wreaths of vine or ivy circling their balding heads. Satyrs often carry the thyrsus: the rod of Dionysus tipped with a pine cone.
Satyrs acquired their goat-like aspect through later Roman conflation with Faunus, a carefree Italic nature spirit of similar characteristics and identified with the Greek god Pan. Hence satyrs are most commonly described in Latin literature as having the upper half of a man and the lower half of a goat, with a goat\'s tail in place of the Greek tradition of horse-tailed satyrs; therefore, satyrs became nearly identical with fauns. Mature satyrs are often depicted in Roman art with goat\'s horns, while juveniles are often shown with bony nubs on their foreheads.
About Satyrs, Praxiteles gives a new interpretation on the subject of free and carefree life. Instead of an elf with pointed ears and repulsive goat hooves, we face a child of nature, pure, but tame and fearless and brutal instincts necessary to enable it to defend itself against threats, and survives even without the help of modern civilization . Above all though, the Satyr with flute has a small companion for him, shows the deep connection with nature, the soft whistle of the wind, the sound of gurgling water of the crystal spring, the birds singing, or perhaps the singing a melody of a human soul that feeds higher feelings. As Dionysiac creatures they are lovers of wine and women, and they are ready for every physical pleasure. They roam to the music of pipes (auloi), cymbals, castanets, and bagpipes, and they love to dance with the nymphs (with whom they are obsessed, and whom they often pursue), and have a special form of dance called sikinnis. Because of their love of wine, they are often represented holding wine cups, and they appear often in the decorations on wine cups.
In Greek mythology and art This Hellenistic satyr wears a rustic perizoma (loincloth) and carries a pedum (shepherd\'s crook). Walters Art Museum, Baltimore. Satyr on a mountain goat, drinking with women, in a Gandhara relief of 2nd-4th century CE Dancing satyr on a sardonyx intaglio holding a thyrsus in his left hand and a kantharos in the right hand. On the right arm, the skin of a panther (pardalis). 1st century BC or beginning of 1st century.In earlier Greek art, satyrs appear as old and ugly, but in later art, especially in works of the Attic school, this savage characteristic is softened into a more youthful and graceful aspect.
This transformation or humanization of the Satyr appears throughout late Greek art. Another example of this shift occurs in the portrayal of Medusa and in that of the Amazon, characters who are traditionally depicted as barbaric and uncivilized. A very humanized Satyr is depicted in a work of Praxiteles known as the \"Resting Satyr\".
Notice, the goat on the left has a short goat tail, but the Greek satyr on the right has a long horse tail. Not a goat tail (Attic ceramic, 520 BCE).Older satyrs were known as sileni, the younger as satyrisci. The hare was the symbol of the shy and timid satyr. Greek spirits known as Calicantsars have a noticeable resemblance to the ancient satyrs; they have goats\' ears and the feet of donkeys or goats or horses, are covered with hair, and love women and the dance.
Although they are not mentioned by Homer, in a fragment of Hesiod\'s works they are called brothers of the mountain nymphs and Kuretes, strongly connected with the cult of Dionysus. In the Dionysus cult, male followers are known as satyrs and female followers as maenads or bacchants.
In Attica there was a species of drama known as the legends of gods and heroes, and the chorus was composed of satyrs and sileni. In the Athenian satyr plays of the 5th century BC, the chorus commented on the action. This \"satyric drama\" burlesqued the serious events of the mythic past with lewd pantomime and subversive mockery. One complete satyr play from the 5th century survives, the Cyclops of Euripides.
The Satyr and the Traveller, one of Aesop\'s Fables, features the satyr as the benevolent host for a traveller in the forest in winter. The satyr is bewildered by the man\'s claim to be able to blow hot and cold with the same breath, first to warm his hands, then to cool his porridge, and turns him out for this inconstancy.
A papyrus bearing a long fragment of a satyr play by Sophocles, given the title \'Tracking Satyrs\' (Ichneutae), was found at Oxyrhynchus in Egypt, 1907.
In Roman mythology and art Satyr pursuing a nymph, on a Roman mosaicFaunus were conflated in the popular and poetic imagination with Latin spirits of woodland and with the rustic Greek god Pan. Roman satyrs were described as goat-like from the haunches to the hooves, and were often pictured with larger horns, even ram\'s horns. Roman poets often conflated them with the fauns.
Roman satire is a literary form, a poetic essay that was a vehicle for biting, subversive social and personal criticism. Though Roman satire is sometimes linked to the Greek satyr plays, satire\'s only connection to the satyric drama is through the subversive nature of the satyrs themselves, as forces in opposition to urbanity, decorum, and civilization itself.
Other references Nymphs and Satyr(William-Adolphe Bouguereau, 1873)
In many versions of the Bible, Isaiah 13:21 and 34:14, the English word \"satyr\" is used to represent the Hebrew se\'irim, \"hairy ones,\" from \"sa\'ir\" or \"goat\". There is an allusion to the practice of sacrificing to the se\'irim (KJV \"devils\"; ASV \"he-goats\") in Leviticus 17:7. They may correspond to the \"shaggy demon of the mountain-pass\" (azabb al-‘akaba) of old Arab legend. It may otherwise refer to literal goats, and the worship of such.
The savant Sir William Jones often refers to the Indian mythological Vānaras as satyrs/mountaineers in his translations of Sanskrit works.[citation needed] This view is generally held to be a mistake by present day researchers.[citation needed]
Baby satyr Female Satyr Carrying Two Putti by Claude Michel (1738–1814) Bronze satyr (height 0.35m) from the Mahdia shipwreck (Musée National du Bardo, Tunis.)Baby satyrs, or child satyrs, are mythological creatures related to the satyr. They appear in popular folklore, classical artworks, film, and in various forms of local art.
Some classical works depict young satyrs being tended to by older, sober satyrs, while there are also some representations of child satyrs taking part in Bacchanalian / Dionysian rituals (including drinking alcohol, playing musical instruments, and dancing).
The presence of a baby or child satyr in a classical work, such as on a Greek vase, was mainly an aesthetic choice on the part of the artist. However, the role of a child in Greek art might imply a further meaning for baby satyrs: Eros, the son of Aphrodite, is consistently represented as a child or baby, and Bacchus, the divine sponsor of satyrs, is seen in numerous works as a baby, often in the company of the satyrs. A prominent instance of a baby satyr outside ancient Greece is Albrecht Dürer\'s 1505 engraving, \"Musical Satyr and Nymph with Baby (Satyr\'s Family)\". There is also a Victorian period napkin ring depicting a baby satyr next to a barrel, which further represents the perception of baby satyrs as partaking in the Bacchanalian festivities.
There are also many works of art of the rococo period depicting child or baby satyrs in Bacchanalian celebrations. Some works depict female satyrs with their children; others describe the child satyrs as playing an active role in the events, including one instance of a painting by Jean Raoux (1677–1735). \"Mlle Prévost as a Bacchante\" depicts a child satyr playing a tambourine while Mlle Prévost, a dancer at the Opéra, is dancing as part of the Bacchanal festivities.
Satyrs and orangutanIn the 17th century, the satyr legend came to be associated with stories of the orangutan, a great ape now found only in Sumatra and Borneo. Many early accounts which apparently refer to this animal describe the males as being sexually aggressive towards human women and towards females of its own species. The first scientific name given to this ape was Simia satyrus.
Varieties- Island Satyrs, which according to Pausanias were a savage race of red-haired, satyr-like creatures from an isolated island chain.
- Libyan Aegipanes (goat-pans), which according to Pliny the Elder lived in Libya, had human heads and torsos, and the legs and horns of goats, and were similar to the Greek god Pan.
- Libyan Satyr, which according to Pliny the Elder lived in Libya and resembled humans with long, pointed ears and horse tails, similar to the Greek nature-spirit satyrs.
Medieval bestiaries also mention several varieties of satyrs, sometimes comparing them to apes or monkeys.
A bald, bearded, horse-tailed satyr balances a winecup on his penis, on an Attic red-figured psykter, ca. 500-490 BC- Centaur, half man, half horse (Greek mythology)
- Faun, (Roman mythology)
- Fairy
- Glaistig, (Scottish folklore)
- Jinn
- Leszi, (Slavic mythology)
- List of satyrs in popular culture
- Pan, (Greek mythology)
- Sileni, (Greek mythology)
- The Birth of Tragedy, by Nietzsche
- Thiasos, the Dionysian retinue
- Torgo, a character in Manos: The Hands of Fate
- Urisk, goat-man fairy (Scottish folklore)
- The Trackers of Oxyrhynchus, a play
An amphora (plural: amphorae or amphoras) is a type ofvase-shaped, usuallyceramic (specimens in materials such as metal occur occasionally) container with two handles and a long neck narrower than the body. The word amphora isLatin, derived from theGreek amphoreus (αμφορεύς), an abbreviation of amphiphoreus, a compound word combining amphi- (\"on both sides\", \"twain\") plus phoreus (\"carrier\"), from pherein (\"to carry\"), referring to the vessel\'s two carrying handles on opposite sides.
Further, the term also stands for an ancienta title=\"Ancient Roman units of measurement\" unit of measurement for liquids. The volume of a Roman amphora was one cubicfoot, ca. 26,026L.
Amphorae were used in vast numbers to transport and store various products, both liquid and dry, in the ancientMediterranean world and later theRoman Empire, and in some periods the shape was also used for luxury pottery, which might be elaborately painted. Stoppers of perishable materials which have rarely survived were used to seal the contents. Two principal types of amphorae existed: the neck amphora, in which the neck and body meet at a sharp angle; and the one-piece amphora, in which the neck and body form a continuous curve. Neck amphorae were commonly used in the early history of ancient Greece but were gradually replaced by the one-piece type from around the 7th century BCE onwards. Most were produced with a pointed base to allow upright storage by being partly embedded in sand or soft ground. This also facilitated transport by ship, where the amphorae were tightly packed together, with ropes passed through their handles to prevent breaking or toppling during rough seas. In kitchens and shops amphorae could be stored in racks with round holes in them.
Amphorae varied greatly in height. The largest could stand as much as 1.5 metres (5ft) high, while some were under 30 centimetres (12in) high - the smallest were called amphoriskoi (literally \"little amphorae\"). Most were around 45 centimetres (18in) high. There was a significant degree of standardisation in some variants; the wine amphora held a standard measure of about 39 litres (41 US qt), giving rise to the amphora quadrantal as a unit of measure in the Roman Empire. In all, around 66 distinct types of amphora have been identified.
Thasos or Thassos (Greek: Θάσος) is a Greek island in the northern Aegean Sea, close to the coast of Thrace and the plain of the river Nestos but geographically part of Macedonia. And it is where Clive Cussler novel \"The Mediterranean Caper\" takes place.
History PrehistoryLying close to the coast of Eastern Macedonia, Thasos was inhabited from the Palaeolithic period onwards, but the earliest settlement to have been explored in detail is that at Limenaria where Middle and Late Neolithic remains have been found which relate closely to those of the Drama Plain. In contrast, the remains of the Early Bronze Age on the island align it with the culture which developed in the Cylcades and Sporades to the south in the Aegean. At Skala Sotiros for example, a small settlement was encircled by a strongly built defensive wall. Even earlier activity is demonstrated by the presence of large pieces of \'megalithic\' anthropomorphic stelai built into these walls which, so far, have no parallels in the Aegean area.
There is then a gap in the archaeological record until the end of the Bronze Age c 1100 BC, when the first burials took place at the large cemetery of Kastri in the interior of the island. Here built tombs covered with small mound of earth were typical until the end of the Iron Age. In the earliest tombs were a small number of locally imitated Mycenaean pottery vessels, but the majority of the hand-made pottery with incised decoration reflects connections eastwards with Thrace and beyond.
AntiquityThe island was colonized at an early date by Phoenicians, attracted probably by its gold mines; they founded a temple to the god Melqart, whom the Greeks identified as \"Tyrian Heracles\", and whose cult was merged with Heracles in the course of the island\'s Hellenization. The temple still existed in the time of Herodotus. An eponymous Thasos, son of Phoenix (or of Agenor, as Pausanias reported) was said to have been the leader of the Phoenicians, and to have given his name to the island.
In either 720 or 708 BC, Thasos received a Greek colony from Paros. It was in a war which the Parian colonists waged with the Saians, a Thracian tribe, that the poet Archilochus threw away his shield. The Greeks extended their power to the mainland, where they owned gold mines which were even more valuable than those on the island. From these sources the Thasians drew great wealth, their annual revenues amounting to 200 or even 300 talents. Herodotus, who visited Thasos, says that the best mines on the island were those which had been opened by the Phoenicians on the east side of the island facing Samothrace.
Thasos was important during the Ionian Revolt against Persia. After the capture of Miletus (494 BC) Histiaeus, the Ionian leader, laid siege. The attack failed, but, warned by the danger, the Thasians employed their revenues to build war ships and strengthen their fortifications. This excited the suspicions of the Persians, and Darius compelled them to surrender their ships and pull down their walls. After the defeat of Xerxes the Thasians joined the Delian confederacy; but afterwards, on account of a difference about the mines and marts on the mainland, they revolted.
The Athenians defeated them by sea, and, after a siege that lasted more than two years, took the capital, Thasos, probably in 463 BC, and compelled the Thasians to destroy their walls, surrender their ships, pay an indemnity and an annual contribution (in 449 BC this was 21 talents, from 445 BC about 30 talents), and resign their possessions on the mainland. In 411 BC, at the time of the oligarchical revolution at Athens, Thasos again revolted from Athens and received a Lacedaemonian governor; but in 407 BC the partisans of Lacedaemon were expelled, and the Athenians under Thrasybulus were admitted.
Roman EraAfter the Battle of Aegospotami (405 BC), Thasos again fell into the hands of the Lacedaemonians under Lysander who formed a decarchy there; but the Athenians must have recovered it, for it formed one of the subjects of dispute between them and Philip II of Macedonia. In the embroilment between Philip III of Macedonia and the Romans, Thasos submitted to Philip, but received its freedom at the hands of the Romans after the battle of Cynoscephalae (197 BC), and it was still a \"free\" state in the time of Pliny.
It is related, that Byzantine Greek Saint Joannicius the Great in one of his miracles freed the island of Thasos from a multitude of snakes (Venerable Joannicius lived through 8-9 centuries).
Ottoman EraThasos was part of the Eastern Roman Empire, later known as Byzantine Empire. It was captured by the Turks in 1462. Under the Turks the island was known as Ottoman Turkish: طاشوز Taşöz. A brief revolt against Ottoman rule in 1821, led by Hajiyorgis Metaxas, failed. The island was given by the Sultan Mahmud II to Muhammad Ali of Egypt of as a personal fiefdom in the late 1820s, as a reward for Egyptian intervention in the War of Greek Independence (which failed to prevent the creation of the modern Greek state). Egyptian rule was relatively benign (by some accounts Muhammad Ali had either been born or spent his infancy on Thasos) and the island became prosperous, until 1908, when the New Turk regime asserted Turkish control. It had the status of a sanjak in the vilayet of Salonici until the Balkan Wars. On October 20, 1912 during the First Balkan War, a Greek naval detachment claimed Thasos as part of Greece, which it has remained since.
World War IIDuring Axis occupation (1941-1944) Thasos, along with the rest of Eastern Macedonia and Thrace, was under Bulgarian control. The Bulgarians planned to annex the territory under their control and closed down schools as a first step towards forced Bulgarization. Under Bulgarian rule the island was called Bulgarian: Тасос. Mountainous terrain facilitated small-scale resistance activity. The Greek Civil War affected the island in the form of skirmishes and Communist guerilla attacks until 1950, almost a year after the main hostilities were over on the mainland.
Modern Era Thasos in 1950\'s Church in ThasosThasos, the capital (now informally known as Limenas, or \"the port\"), stood on the north side of the island, and had two harbors. Archilochus described Thasos as \"an ass\'s backbone crowned with wild wood,\" and the description still suits the mountainous island with its forests of fir and pine. Besides its gold mines, the wine, nuts and marble of Thasos were well known in antiquity. Thasian wine (a light bodied wine with a characteristic apple scent) was, in particular, quite famous; to the point where all Thasian coins carried the head of the wine god Dionysos on one side and bunches of grape of the other.
Today, Thasos is a part of the Kavala prefecture and is the southernmost and the Easternmost points in the prefecture. Under local government reform in the late 1990s, the entire island became a single municipality. Thasos is served ferry routes to and from Kavala and Keramoti. The latter is a port at the Eastern portion of the prefecture, close to Kavala International Airport, and has the shortest possible crossing to the island.
Geography Thasos from space, April 1993Thasos has generally round shape, without deep bays and significant peninsulas. The highest peak, Ypsario or Ipsario, is 1,205 m (3428 ft) high and lies in the Eastern half of the island, which is steeper and mostly covered in pine forest. The western half has gentler slopes. While generally mountainous, the terrain is not particularly rugged, as it rises gradually from the coast towards the island center.
Most villages were placed inland, as the population was chiefly engaged in agriculture and stockbreeding. Those villages had their harbors at nearest points on the shore, often connected with stairways (\"Skalas\") and the population gradually migrated there, as tourism began to emerge as an important source of income. Thus, there are several pairs of villages such as Marion–Skala Maries, where the former is inland and the latter on the coast.
Geology Geological and Metallogenic map of Thasos Island.Thasos island is located in the northern Aegean sea approximately 7km from the mainland and 20km south-east of Kavala. The Island is formed mainly by gneisses, schists and marbles of the Rhodope Massif. Marble sequences, corresponding to the Falacron Marbles intercalated by schists and gneisses, are up to 500m thick and are separated from the underlying gneisses by a transition zone about 300 m thick termed the T-zone consisting of alternances of dolomitic and calcitic marbles intercalated by schists and gneisses.
The rocks have undergone several periods of regional metamorphism, to at least upper amphibolite facies, and there was a subsequent phase of retrograde metamorphism. At least three periods of regional deformation have been identified, the most important being large scale isoclinal folding with axes aligned north-west. The T-zone is deformed and is interpreted by some authors as a regional thrust of pre-major folding age. There are two major high angle fault systems aligned north-west and north-east respectively. A large low-angle thrust cuts the gneiss, schist and marble sequence at the south-west corner of the island, probably indicating an overthrusting of the Serbomacedonian Massif onto the Rodope Massif.
The Late Miocene oil-producing Nestos-Prinos basin is located between Thassos island and the mainland. The floor of the basin is around 1,500 m deep off the Thassos coast(South Kavala ridge; Proedrou, 1988) and up to 4.000-5.000 m in the axial sector between Thassos and the mainland. The basin is filled with Late Miocene-Pliocene sediments, including ubiquitously repeated evaporite layers of rock salt and anhydrite-dolomite which alternate with sandstones, conglomerates, black shales, and uraniferous coal measures (Proedrou, 1979, 1988; Taupitz, 1985). Stratigraphically equivalent rocks on the mainland are clastic sediments with coal beds, marine to brackish fluvial units and travertines.
Mining historyMining activities for base and precious metals started in the 7th century B.C. with the Phoenicians, followed in the 4th century by the Greeks and then the Romans. The mining was both open - pit and underground, and concentrated on the numerous karst hosted calamine deposits for lead and silver although there was also minor exploitation of gold and copper. Worth mentioning is the discovery of a paleolithic addit located at Tzines iron mine, whose age has being estimated at approximately 15.000 years old, (Kovkouli et al. 1988) for the exploitation of limonitic ochre.
EconomyThe main agricultural production on the island are honey and olive oil as well as wine, sheep, goat herding and fishing. Other industries includes lumber and tourism. Mining industry includes lead, zinc and marble, especially in the Panagia area where one of the mountains near the Thracian Sea has a large marble quarry. Now abandoned marble quarry in the south (in the area of Aliki) has been mined during the ancient times. By far the most important economic activity is tourism.
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Thasos Silver Ancient Greek Coin Nude Satyr - Pan & Dionysus companion i40634:
$657.77