PHRYGIA. Cibyra. Pseudo-autonomous issue. Assarion (Bronze, 17 mm, 4.30 g, 6 h), Klau. Bias, high priest. Time of Domitian, 81-96. ΚΙΒΥΡΑΤΩΝ - [Ι-ΝΩ] Veiled and draped bust of Ino to right.
Rev. ЄΠΙ ΑΡΧΙЄΡ ΚΛΑΥ ΒΙΑΝΤΟϹ Zebu bull butting to right. BMC 21. RPC II 1267.4 (
this coin). Edge crack and with minor scratches on the reverse
, otherwise, very fine.
From the collection of G. Plankenhorn (with collector's ticket), ex Hirsch 173, 18 February 1992, 450.
Ino was a daughter of Kadmos, the founder and first king of Thebes, and one of the nurses of the infant Dionysos, himself a son of her sister, Semele, and Zeus. For this, Ino was punished by the ever-jealous Hera, who drove her husband, Athamas, mad with rage. He first murdered his eldest child, Learches, then pursued his wife, who, out of despair, jumped off a cliff into the sea with her other son, Melikertes. The mother-son pair was welcomed by the sea-gods, however, and were themselves granted godhood as Leukothea and Palaimon.
