Cook, Arthur B.: Zeus: a study in ancient religion (Band 1): Zeus god of the bright sky (Cambridge, 1914)

124 The Mountain as the Throne of Zeus

(b) The Mountain as the Throne of Zeus.

The mountain sacred to Zeus was sometimes regarded as his
seat or throne. Coins of Gomphoi or Philippopolis from about
350 B.C. onwards show Zeus Akraios seated on a rock and holding
a sceptre in his right hand (fig. 90)1: in place of the rock, which
must represent Mount Pindos, later specimens substitute a throne
(figs. 91, 92)2. Again, coins of Kyrrhos in Syria struck by Trajan and

Fig. 90. Fig. 91. Fig. 92.

other emperors have Zeus Kataibdtes sitting on a rock with thunder-
bolt, sceptre, and eagle3: the rock is presumably some neighbouring
height. Similarly a coin of Ankyra in Galatia struck by Antoninus
Pius represents Zeus, with a sceptre in his right hand and a Victory
in his left, seated on a rock4: Ankyra too was situated in a
mountainous district. We have already noted an imperial coin
of Prousa in Bithynia, which shows Zeus or a Zeus-like mountain-
god reclining on the summit of the Mysian Olympos (fig. 85)5.

Fig- 93-

I add a few other numismatic examples, the interpretation of
which is more doubtful. Copper coins of Larisa on the Orontes,
struck in the first century B.C., have the head of Zeus as their
obverse and the throne of Zeus as their reverse type (fig. 93)6.
This perhaps implies that a neighbouring height was regarded as

1 Brit. Mus. Cat. Coins Thessaly etc. p. 19 pi. 3, 2, Head Hist, num.2 p. 295.
Append. B Thessalia.

2 Brit. Mus. Cat. Coins Thessaly etc. p. 19 (I figure no. 3) pi. 3, 4, Hunter Cat.
Coins i. 450, Head loc. cit. Fig. 92 is an unpublished variety (with the Thessalian form
TOM^ITOYN) in my collection.

3 Infra ch. ii § 3 (a) ii.

4 Rasche Lex. Num. Suppl. i. 663, iii. 252.

5 Supra p. 116 n. 8.

G Brit. Mus. Cat. Coins Galatia etc. p. 264 pi. 31, 8, Head Hist, num.2 p. 782.