Obol

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Numismatists – the scholars who study coins – refer to the ‘front’ side of the coin, which usually features the head of a person or god, as the ‘obverse,’ and the ‘back’ side as the ‘reverse.’ This small silver coin is in fragmentary condition, making it difficult to identify the types on it. On the obverse, a bust of the king faces to the left. He has a beard and long wavy hair, and wears a crenelated crown. The image is surrounded by a border of dots. The reverse type is all but impossible to discern, though parts of a Persian inscription are visible. This coin was minted by King Ardashir II of Persis, sometime in the first century B.C. Persis refers to a region in southwestern Iran which was the heartland of the Achaemenid Empire. Under the Seleucids and Parthians, Persis was ruled by client kings like Ardashir, who combined elements of Achaemenid, Seleucid and Parthian iconography on their coins. This coin was excavated at Qasr-i Abu Nasr, near Shiraz. Much of the material from the site dates to the Sasanian period (A.D. 224-651); this coin is one the few objects suggesting it was occupied in the Parthian period as well.

Ancient Near Eastern Art

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Met's Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art cares for approximately 7,000 works ranging in date from the eighth millennium B.C. through the centuries just beyond the emergence of Islam in the seventh century A.D. Objects in the collection were created by people in the area that today comprises Iraq, Iran, Turkey, Syria, the Eastern Mediterranean coast, Yemen, and Central Asia. From the art of some of the world's first cities to that of great empires, the department's holdings illustrate the beauty and craftsmanship as well as the profound interconnections, cultural and religious diversity, and lasting legacies that characterize the ancient art of this vast region.

Metropolitan Museum of Art