Numismata hellenica: a catalogue of Greek coins; with notes, a map ...

NOTE ON THE WEIGHTS OF GREEK COINS. [3
Roman emperor. The tribute was a denarius, in the English version a penny * ; the duty to the temple was a
didrachmon, two of which made a stater ". It appears that the half-shekel of ransom had, in the time of our Saviour,
been converted into the payment of a didrachmon to the temple ; and two of these didrachma formed a stater of the
Jewish currency. This stater was evidently the extant " Shekel Israel," which was a tetradrachmon of the Ptolemaic
of the Ptolemies '
scale, though generally below the standard weight, like most of the extant specimens ; the didrachmon
paid to the temple was, therefore, of the same monetary scale. Thus the duty to the temple was converted from
the half of an Attic to the whole of a Ptolemaic didrachmon, and the tax was nominally raised in the proportion of
about 105 to 65 ; but probably the value of silver had fallen as much in the two preceding centuries. It was natural
that the Jews, when they began to strike money, should have revived the old name Shekel, and applied it to their
Stater, or principal coin ; and equally so, that they should have adopted the scale of the neighbouring opulent and
powerful kingdom, the money of which they must have long been in the habit of employing. The inscription on
the coin appears to have been expressly intended to distinguish the monetary shekel or stater from the Shekel ha-
Kodesh, or Shekel of the Sanctuary.
That the Greek cities of Asia Minor founded their monetary scales upon the Phoenician shekel, either through
Lydia or by the early communication of the Phoenicians with the maritime cities, seems evident from the stater of
Cyzicus {K.v^iK)]vo