Such an innovation as this, such a complete upsetting of the ancient deeply rooted idea of the connection between the gods and the coinage could not be introduced all at once. It had to be effected by degrees. Alexander the Great even in his lifetime gave himself out as the son of Zeus Ammon, and after his death the idea of his divinity gained ground year by year. The first step towards the new fashion of placing the king’s head upon the coinage was made by Lysimachus of Thrace, who introduced on his money the portrait of the deified Alexander in the character of the son of Ammon with the ram’s horn over the ear.

Ptolemy Soter, king of Egypt, the first of the dynasty which ruled Egypt for two centuries and a half after the death of Alexander, was the first monarch who placed his own head upon his coins. By slow degrees his example was followed, first in Asia and finally in Europe, where Philip V. of Macedon, B.C. 220, was the first king whose portrait in the character of a mortal, and not disguised as a demi-god, appears upon the coinage.

The influence of the old religious beliefs nevertheless maintained so firm a hold on men’s minds that the reverses of Greek coins continued to bear sacred types throughout the Roman Imperial period; and even on the money of the Byzantine emperors when Christianity had become the State religion, the figures of Christ and the Virgin, or the sign of the Cross, still bear witness that the same religious sanction in a new form continued to be invoked for the coin of the realm.

§ THE GODS AS REPRESENTED ON THE COINAGE.

Zeus (Jupiter). The head of this god is almost always bearded and crowned with laurel or olive [(Fig. 1]). The youthful head called Zeus Hellenios, on certain coins of Syracuse, is however beardless, and but for the inscription which in this case accompanies it, would be indistinguishable from a head of Apollo.

Zeus Ammon [(Fig. 2]), frequent on coins of Cyrene, is distinguished by the ram’s horn behind the ear. This god is sometimes beardless.

The head of the Zeus of Dodona is represented with a wreath of oak-leaves [(Fig. 3)].

Fig. 1.
Zeus (Jupiter).		Fig. 2.
Zeus (Ammon).		Fig. 3. Zeus
(Jupiter).