FISH ON COINS AND MEDALS 273 
an electrum stater with a Tunny upright between two sacrificial 
fillets, which may signify that this tunny was closely connected 
with some deity or was itself of a sacro-sanct character. 
Even more remarkable is a coin of Abdera in His- 
pania Betica. This carries on its obverse a laureat head of 
Tiberius: on its reverse a four-pillared temple, two of the 
columns of which are in the form of fish. This unique repre- 
sentation has never been fully explained.! 
It is surely a happy coincidence that on some mintages 
of Imperial date the fish occurs together with the head of some 
° 
9009¢00000° 
29 
LAUREAT HEAD OF TIBERIUS AND TEMPLE WITH TWO COLUMNS IN SHAPE OF 
FISH, FROM A COIN OF ABDERA, 
From A. Heiss, Pl. 45, 9. 
self-styled deities, such as that choice couple, Nero and 
Domitian. On sundry pieces struck by Nero, the octopus- 
like and predatory Sepia not inappropriately finds place; but 
monstrously incongruous seem the coins which associate the 
man-serving and man-saving Dolphin with the self-serving 
and man-slaying Domitian.? 
With the Jews, although its emblematic employment was 
scanty, the fish occasionally figured, e.g. as a sign of Judah. 
In the Talmud it appears more frequently, and as symbolic 
of some moral quality—e.g. of innocence. In Japan the carp 
1 A. Heiss, op. ctt., pl. 45, 9. 
2 See Cohen, Monnaies Domitian, Nos. 227, 229, 236, and Pitra, op. cit., 
pp. 508-512. Although writing some sixty years ago he enumerates no less 
than 156 illustrations from coins and representations of fish association. 
3 For the fish-symbol in Judaism there is a good collection of facts in 
I. Scheftelowitz, ‘Das Fisch-Symbol in Judentum und Christentum,”’ in the 
Archiv. fur Religionswirsenschaft (1911), XIV. 1-53, 321-392. 
