Looking for Judaea coins expert

On Thu, 03 Jul 2003 21:59:06 GMT, Curtis Hoffmann
wrote:


For the Pontius Pilot coin, the text is unreadable. The description
says "Lituus suurounded by TIBEPIOIY KAICAPOC". What is a Lituus, and
what do the words translate to?

Pilot - Pilate

D'oh!


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Curtis Hoffmann
Three Steps Over the Edge
http://home.austin.rr.com/tsote/index.html
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Curtis wrote:

"For the Pontius Pilot coin, the text is unreadable. The description says
'Lituus suurounded by TIBEPIOIY KAICAPOC'. What is a Lituus, and what do the
words translate to?"


A lituus is a crook or staff used (supposedly) for divination. You sometimes
see it on Roman coins, for example on this Vespasian reverse. It's just to the
right of the jug.

http://www.celator.com/cgi-bin/fp.cg...tem=1099627251

I would translate TIBEPIOIY KAICAPOC as (of) Tiberius Caesar. Pontius Pilate
was procurator of Judea under Tiberius, so this makes sense to me.

HTH



Anka Z
Co-president of the once thriving, but now defunct, Tommy John Fan Club.
Go, Lake County Captains!

Curtis Hoffmann wrote in message . ..
According to the coin dealer's attributions, they are Hendin
499 and Hendin 649/650.

The Herod coin has an anchor on one side, and just a handful of
jumbled letters on the other (four of them match up with the regular
spelling of "Herod", but there's an "E" and "D" left over) Just
wondering what the ED would mean.

According to Hendin's catalogue, the legend for this type is "Erodou
basileos" (in Greek script) meaning "(of) Herod, King", spelled out in
two concentric circles and often a bit sloppily engraved. The Greek
script, by the way, is eta-rho-omega-delta-omicron-upsilon
beta-alpha-sigma-iota-lambda-epsilon-omega-sigma (all capital
letters).


For the Pontius Pilot coin, the text is unreadable. The description
says "Lituus suurounded by TIBEPIOIY KAICAPOC". What is a Lituus, and
what do the words translate to?

As Anka has already pointed out, the inscription means "(of)
Tiberius, Caesar" and a Lituus was a staff used fortune-telling in
Roman religious ceremonies. Interestingly, the other main coin type
issued by Pontius Pilate shows a simpulum, a type of ladle used to
pour out libations during Roman ceremonies. His use of pagan
religious symbols on coins for the Jewish populace was but one example
of his insensitivity to local feelings. Hendin's book "A Guide to
Biblical Coins", now in its fourth edition, is excellent- it
interweaves the coins with the relevant history and traditions in a
very accessible way, and I recommend it to anyone interested in
ancient coins.

-Robert A. DeRose, Jr.