Lydian / Gold stater / ca. 560?546 B.C.

Lydian
Gold stater
ca. 560?546 B.C.
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Creator Nationality: Asian; Anatolian; Lydian
Creator Name-CRT: Lydian
Title: Gold stater
View: Principal view
Creation Start Date: 0
Creation End Date: 2
Creation Date: ca. 560?546 B.C.
Creation Place: From Sardis
Object Type: Decorative Arts and Utilitarian Objects
Materials and Techniques: gold
Dimensions: No measurment
Description: The stater was a standard form of currency in antiquity. There are gold, electrum, and silver staters, and their standard weight varies according to their place of issue. Thirty gold staters like this one were found in a small terracotta jug. Each is stamped with the confronted foreparts of a lion and bull. The jug was probably buried for safekeeping shortly before the Persian conquest of Sardis, the capital of the Lydian empire, in 547 B.C. The Greek historian Herodotus wrote that the Lydians invented coinage and that Croesus, who reigned from about 560 to 546 B.C., was the first king to issue both gold and silver coins. Excavations at Sardis have revealed workshops where gold refining was carried out.
AMICA Contributor: The Metropolitan Museum of Art
Owner Location: New York, New York
ID Number: 26.59.2
Credit Line: Gift of The American Society for the Excavation of Sardis, 1926
Copyright: Copyright ? 2002 The Metropolitan Museum of Art. All rights reserved.
Rights: http://www.metmuseum.org/education/er_photo_lib.asp
AMICA ID: MMA_.26.59.2
AMICA Library Year: 2002
Media Metadata Rights: Copyright (c) 2002 The Metropolitan Museum of Art. All Rights Reserved

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