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8 - Antiochus IV
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- By Otto Mørkholm, Nationalmuseet, Copenhagen
- Edited by W. D. Davies, Louis Finkelstein
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- Book:
- The Cambridge History of Judaism
- Published online:
- 28 March 2008
- Print publication:
- 22 March 1990, pp 278-291
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Summary
For about twenty years the Jews of Palestine lived peacefully under the system of government established by Antiochus III after his conquest of the country in 200 b.c.e. (see above, chapter 2). Some of the leading families may for personal or traditional reasons have preferred the Ptolemaic rule, but to the majority it made no difference whether they were governed from Alexandria or Antioch. The son and successor of the conqueror, Seleucus IV (187–175 b.c.e.), continued, during the first part of his reign, his father's wise and tolerant policy and made contributions to the sacrifices in the Temple in Jerusalem. When troubles arose towards the end of Seleucus IV's reign, their causes must be sought in internal tension and strife between various factions or groups within the Jewish community. Already in the third century b.c.e. the antagonism between the rich and influential Tobiads and the Oniads, who held the office of high priest, had disclosed a serious disagreement within the leading Jewish circles as to the attitude towards the problems of coexistence with the surrounding peoples and a certain assimilation of the dominant Greek–Hellenistic culture (see chapter 2).
The first incident in this new series of quarrels among the Jews was the clash between the high priest, Onias III, and the epistatēs or financial administrator of the Temple, a certain Simon. As the latter was unable to secure the post of agoranomos or overseer of the market for himself on account of the high priest's opposition, he turned to the Seleucid governor of the province of Coele-Syria and Phoenicia, Apollonius, son of Menestheus, and revealed to him the existence of large funds in the Temple treasury, suggesting that the money might be appropriated by the Syrian king.
2 - The life of obverse dies in the Hellenistic period
- C. N. L. Brooke, B. H. I. Stewart, J. G. Pollard, T. R. Volk
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- Book:
- Studies in Numismatic Method
- Published online:
- 05 May 2010
- Print publication:
- 21 April 1983, pp 11-22
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Summary
A new and important numismatic method which has been developed since the end of the last century is to try to identify the individual dies from which a series of coins was struck by comparing as many as possible of the surviving pieces. Obverse and reverse dies deteriorate at different rates, and they break and are replaced at different times. It is therefore possible to establish sequences of die links for specimens which share a common die, and the order of the dies within the sequence may be determined by careful study of the progressive wear of a given die as it is exhibited through successive strikings. In this way many series have been classified and the relative chronology of issues established, providing a detailed understanding of how certain mints operated. In applying this method it is usually taken for granted that if two coins can be shown to be the product of the same die, they were struck at about the same time and in the same place. What, however, is meant by ‘the same time’? Surely not necessarily ‘within one day’ or ‘within one week’? Surely not necessarily ‘within one day’ or ‘within one week’? Most scholars would probably agree that even a month may be too brief a span for many issues. But what then? Several months, a year, several years, even decades?