MEDAL. £07 
numbers of coins; though Cicero mentions his being in 
poffefiion of an immenfe treafure in them at the time he 
was governor of Alia Minor. “ It is molt likely (fays 
Mr. Pinkerton) that his wealth fhould be in the coin of 
the country to which he belonged: but what had thefe 
triumphs, or Cicero’s government, to do with Cretan mo¬ 
ney ? But indeed the coins themfelves, as above noticed, 
eftablilh the faft.” 
Another fet of coins famous in antiquity were thofe of 
Cyzicus in Myfia, which were of gold ; but they are now 
alrnolt entirely vanifhed by being recoined in other forms. 
See fig. ii. The Agiavhxov or “ money of Ary- 
andes,” who was made governor of Egypt by Cambyfes, 
is made mention of by Hefychius; but none of them, as 
far as is known, have reached our times. They mud 
have been marked with Perfian characters, if with any. 
The coin of queen PhiliJUs is mentioned by the fame wri¬ 
ter, and many of thete pieces are 11:11 extant; but we 
know not where this queen reigned, nor does there feetn 
to be any method of finding it out. Mr. Pinkerton in¬ 
clines to believe, that (he prefided over Sicily ; and, as a 
confirmation of that fuppolition, mentions fome infcrip- 
tions of BA2IA1EXA2 <3>IA12TIAOS on the gradini of the 
theatre of Syracufe; but which appear not older than the 
Roman times. Some authors are of opinion, that fhe 
reigned in Coffara or Malta; which our author thinks 
much more improbable. 
The moll particular attention with regard to the names 
and ftandard of coins is due to thofe of Athens; and it 
is remarkable, that moll of them which have reached us 
are of a very late period, with the names of magiltrates 
infcri'oed upon them. Some of thefe bear the name of 
Mithridales ; and few are older than the era of that prince; 
•who, it is well known, took the city of Athens in his 
war with the Romans. “ I fufpedt (fays Mr. Pinkerton) 
that no Athenian coins of filver are posterior to Sylla’s 
infamous deitruftion of that city; an event the more re¬ 
markable, as Sailuft tells us, that Sylla was learned in 
Greek. It is If ill more remarkable, that the fabric of 
Athenian coins is almoft univerfally very rude: a fingular 
circumftance, if we reflect how much the arts flourilhed 
there. It can only be accounted for from the excellence 
of their artills being fuch as to occafion all the good ones 
to be called into other countries, and none but the bad 
left at home. In like manner, the coins ftruck at Rome 
in the imperial times are excellent, as being done by the 
beft Greek artills; while thofe of Greece, though famous 
at that time for producing miraculous artills, are during 
that period commonly of very mean execution. The 
opulence of Athens in her days of glory was very great ; 
owing in an eminent degree to her rich commerce with 
the kingdoms on the Euxine fea, carried on chiefly from 
Delos, which belonged to Athens, and was the grand 
centre of that trade.” Hence it was a matter of furprife to 
Neumann, that, when there are fo many coins of Mycene, 
an illand proverbially poor, there fliould be none of Delos. 
But Mr. Pinkerton accounts for this from Mycene’s being 
a free (late, and Delos fubject to Athens: “ It may be 
•well fuppoied (fays he) that Athens had a mint at Delos; 
and fuch Athenian coins as have fymbols of Apollo, Diana, 
or Latona, were llruck in this illand.” 
The copper money of the Greeks is next in antiquity to 
the filver. Mr. Pinkerton is of opinion, that it was not 
nfed at Athens till the 26th year of the Peloponnefian 
war; about 404. years before Chrift, and three hundred 
after filver was flrlt coined there. The firft copper coins 
were thofe of Gelo of Syracufe, about 490 B. C. 
The chalcos, of brafs, of which eight went to the filver 
obolus, feerns to have been the firft kind of Greek coin. 
At firft it was looked upon as of fo little confequence, that 
it became proverbial; and to fay that a tiling was not 
worth a chalcos, was equivalent to faying that it was worth 
nothing. As the Greeks became poor, however, even this 
diminutive coin was fubdivided into two, four, nay eight, 
or hnall coinsj but our author conjures very fe- 
verely thofe who have given an account of thofe divifions. 
“ Pollux, and Suidas copying from him, (fays lie,) tell us, 
that there were /even lepta to one chalcos ; a number the 
moft unlikely that can be, from its indivifibility and in¬ 
capacity of proportion. Pollux lived in the time of Com- 
modus, fo was too late to be of the fmalleft authority { 
Suidas is four or five centuries later, and out of the quef- 
tion. Pliny tells us, that there were ten chalci to the 
obolus; Diodorus and Cleopatra that there were fix; 
Ilidorus fays there were four: and, if fuch writers differ 
about the larger denomination, we may well imagine that 
the fmaller equally varied in different Hates; an idea fup- 
ported by thofe undeniable witnelfes, the coins which re¬ 
main. Moft of the Greek copper coin which has reached 
our times confilts of chalci ; the lepta being fo ftnall as to 
be much more liable fo be loft.” In Dr. Hunter’s cabi¬ 
net, however, there are feveral of the dilebta of Athens: 
and, from being ftamped with the reprelentation of two 
owls, feetn to be the fame with the filver diobolus : “ a 
circumftance (fays Mr. Pinkerton) of itfelf fufticient to 
confute Pollux; for a dilepton can form no part of feven; 
a number indeed which never appeared in any coinage of 
the fame metals, and is contradictory to common lenfe. 
It may be obferved, that the whole brafs coins of Athens, 
publilhed by Dr. Combe, are reducible to four lizes, which 
may be the lepton, dilepton, tetralepton, or hemilchalcos, and 
chalcos. The firft is not above the fize of one of king 
James I’s farthing tokens; the laft about that of our com¬ 
mon farthing.” The lepta was alfo called xe^oc, as being 
change for the poor. The «£*/?<>;, perhaps fo called from 
the figure of a wolf upon it, was the coin of a particular 
Hate, and if of brafs mull have weighed three chalci. 
The other names of the copper coins of Greece are but 
little known. Lycurgus ordered iron money to be coined 
at Sparta ; but fo perifnable is this metal, that none of 
that kind of money has reached our times. 
After the conquelt of Greece by the Romans, moft of 
the coins of that country diminilhed very much in their 
value, the gold coinage being totally difcontinued: though 
fome of tlie barbarous kings who ul'ed the Greek character 
were permitted to coin gold, hut they ufed the Roman 
model ; and the ftandard ufed by the few cities in Afia 
who fpoke the Greek language in the times of the em¬ 
perors is entirely unknown. Copper feems to have been 
the only metal coined at that time by the Greeks them¬ 
felves ; and that upon the Roman ftandard, then univerfal 
through the empire, that there might be no impediment 
to the circulation of currency. They retained, however, 
fome of their own terms, uling them along with thofe of 
the Romans. The affarion or ajfarium of Rome, the name 
of the diminifhed as, being fixteen to the drachma or de¬ 
narius, the obolus was fo much diminifhed in value as to 
be ftruck in brafs not much larger than the old chalcus, 
and valued at between two and three affaria ; which was 
indeed its ancient rate as to the drachma. This appears 
from the copper coins of Chios, which have their names 
marked upon them. The brafs obolus, at firft equal in 
fize to the Roman fellertius, or large brafs, leffens by de¬ 
grees to about the fize of a filver drachma. From the bad- 
nefs of the imperial coinage in Greece alfo, it appears that 
brafs was very fcarce in that country, as well as in all 
the cities ufing the Greek characters ; being found moltly 
in the weitern countries of the Roman empire. The time 
of this declenlion in fize of the Greek coins is by Mr. 
Pinkerton fuppofed to have been from Augultus down to 
Gallienus. He is of opinion, however, that the copper- 
obolus, at firft above the fize of large brafs, was ufed in 
Greece about the time of its firft fuhjeCtion to Rome ; and 
that, the lepta ceafing, the chalci came in their room, with 
the dichalcus and the heiniobolon of brafs. 
With rel'peCt to the gold coins of the Greeks, Mr. Pin¬ 
kerton is of opinion that none of that metal was coined 
before the time of Philip of Macedon, as none have reached 
our times prior to the reign of that monarch. From a 
paflage in Thucydides our author concludes, that in the 
beginning 
