The numismatic chronicle and journal of the Royal Numismatic Society

CHKONOLOGY OF THE COINS OF CHIOS. 23
emblem on certain coins of Paeonia and Macedonia. 35
At first sight this may not appear quite obvious to
those who have been accustomed to regard the Sphinx
as a peculiarly Dionysiac attribute.
M. Svoronos has shown us, however, in his most
interesting paper, that both Sphinxes
and Griffins
figured in the imagery of the sun-worship that prevailed
throughout nearly the whole district between
the river Axius and the Rhodope mountains. This
cult had its centre on the summit of Mount Pangaeum,
and it can be traced from the Derronians in the west
to the Sagraeans in the east, from the Laeaeans in the
north to the island of Peparethus in the south through
the prevalence on their coins of the solar emblem
of a rosette of pellets in various forms. For details
I must refer the reader to M. Svoronos's learned
article.
On the other hand, to the immediate north of Mount
Pangaeum extended the land of the Edones, and to
the east of it that of the Dionysians, where the worship
of Dionysus had flourished from time immemorial. In
fact the two cults seem to have overlapped both in
their symbolism and in their geographical distribution.
fie
votaries of Dionysus adopted the KVK\OS 'HXt'ov,
d those of Zeus the Sphinx and the Griffin.
Among the Edones, who, as we have seen, were wor-
snippers of Dionysus, was a city called Asoros or Gasoros,
to which reference has been made above. This city
ruck coins over a considerable time, for specimens
are known representing the archaic, the transitional,
and the fine periods of art, with a Sphinx to r. On
a transitional piece, now in the Vienna cabinet, the
33 J. N. Svoronos in Journal Int. tiArch. Num., 1913, pp. 193-280.