Speaker
Description
Research in the twentieth century on the Jewish coins of the Hellenistic–Early Roman periods provided a consensus on the historical identities of the Jewish minting authorities, many named only in Hebrew on the coins. More recent efforts have focused on determining the seriation of the types within each ruler’s tenure and fine-tuning their absolute dates. This has been done for the coins of John Hyrcanus I (2021), Judah Aristobulus (2020), Alexander Jannaeus (2004, 2008), Mattathias Antigonus (2013), and Herod (2012). Here, I propose to refine the dates of one of the ubiquitous late emissions of Alexander Jannaeus, based upon the presence of that high priest/king’s early types — and the absence of his later types — at excavations at El‘ad. This site, located in the southern Sharon Plain, has been shown historically and archaeologically to have been abandoned in the middle to late 80s of the first century BCE.
