(39) Kyrene, Kyrenaica (Libya) - AV 1/10 stater, c. 331-323 B.C.,
0.86 g. (inv. 91.103).
Obverse: Head of Zeus Ammon l.
Reverse: Head of Kyrene r., wearing single-pendant earring
and necklace; monogram in l. field.
Provenance: Abner Kreisberg, 1972.
Bibliography: C.M. Kraay, Archaic and Classical Greek
Coins (Berkeley and Los Angeles 1976) 296-297; B.V. Head, Historia
Numorum (Oxford 1911) 864-871.
In the winter of 332/31 B.C., the Kyrenaians entered into an alliance with
Alexander the Great, and from that time until it was acquired by Ptolemaic
Egypt the city of Kyrene issued a series of gold staters and smaller denominations,
including this tenth of a stater with the head of Zeus Ammon on the obverse
and a female head, perhaps the nymph Kyrene, on the reverse.
Ammon was the chief imperial god of ancient Egypt, who became known to the
Greeks through their colonization of Kyrene and identified with their chief
god Zeus. His was the most important cult in Kyrene, where a Hellenized
version of him was worshipped as Zeus Ammon. In Greek cities he was usually
depicted as a Zeus-like figure but with the ram's horns of the Egyptian
Ammon added. Kyrene was a nymph admired by Apollo for wrestling a lion.
He carried her off to Libya, where the city of Kyrene was named for her.
K.J.B.
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