The invention of coinage in ancient Greece provided an arena in which rival political groups struggled to imprint their views on the world. Here Leslie Kurke analyzes the ideological functions of Greek coinage as one of a number of symbolic practices that arise for the first time in the archaic period. By linking the imagery of metals and coinage to stories about oracles, prostitutes, Eastern tyrants, counterfeiting, retail trade, and games, she traces the rising egalitarian ideology of the polis, as well as the ongoing resistance of an elitist tradition to that development. The argument thus aims to contribute to a Greek "history of ideologies," to chart the ways ideological contestation works through concrete discourses and practices long before the emergence of explicit political theory. To an elitist sensibility, the use of almost pure silver stamped with the state's emblem was a suspicious alternative to the para-political order of gift exchange. It ultimately represented the undesirable encroachment of the public sphere of the egalitarian polis. Kurke re-creates a "language of metals" by analyzing the stories and practices associated with coinage in texts ranging from Herodotus and archaic poetry to Aristotle and Attic inscriptions. She shows that a wide variety of imagery and terms fall into two opposing symbolic domains: the city, representing egalitarian order, and the elite symposium, a kind of anti-city. Exploring the tensions between these domains, Kurke excavates a neglected portion of the Greek cultural "imaginary" in all its specificity and strangeness.

Coins have long been a vital part of the discipline of classical studies of the ancient world. However, many scholars have commented that coins have not been adequately integrated into the study of the New Testament. This book provides an interdisciplinary gateway to the study of numismatics for those who are engaged in biblical studies. Wenkel argues that coins from the 1st century were cultural texts with communicative power. He establishes a simple yet comprehensive hermeneutic that defines coins as cultural texts and explains how they might be interpreted today. Once coins are understood to be cultural texts, Wenkel proceeds to explain how these texts can be approached from three angles. First, the world in front of the coin is defined as the audience who initially read and responded to coins as cultural texts. The entire Roman Empire used coins for payment. Second, the world of the coin refers to the coin itself – the combination of inscriptions and images. This combination of inscription and image was used ubiquitously as a tool of propaganda. Third, the world behind the coin refers to the world of power and production behind the coins. This third angle explores the concept of authorship of coins as cultural texts.

The great mathematician Archimedes, a Sicilian Greek whose machines defended Syracuse against the Romans during the Second Punic War, was killed by a Roman after the city fell, yet it is largely Roman sources, and Greek texts aimed at Roman audiences, that preserve the stories about him. Archimedes' story, Mary Jaeger argues, thus becomes a locus where writers explore the intersection of Greek and Roman culture, and as such it plays an important role in Roman self-definition. Jaeger uses the biography of Archimedes as a hermeneutic tool, providing insight into the construction of the traditional historical narrative about the Roman conquest of the Greek world and the Greek cultural invasion of Rome. By breaking down the narrative of Archimedes' life and examining how the various anecdotes that comprise it are embedded in their contexts, the book offers fresh readings of passages from both well-known and less-studied authors, including Polybius, Cicero, Livy, Vitruvius, Plutarch, Silius Italicus, Valerius Maximus, Johannes Tzetzes, and Petrarch. "Jaeger, in her meticulous and elegant study of different ancient accounts of his life and inventions...reveal more about how the Romans thought about their conquest of the Greek world than about 'science'." ---Helen King, Times Literary Supplement "An absolutely wonderful book on a truly original and important topic. As Jaeger explores neglected texts that together tell an important story about the Romans' views of empire and their relationship to Greek cultural accomplishments, so she has written an important new chapter in the history of science. A genuine pleasure to read, from first page to last." ---Andrew Feldherr, Associate Professor of Classics, Princeton University "This elegantly written and convincingly argued project analyzes Archimedes as a vehicle for reception of the Classics, as a figure for loss and recovery of cultural memory, and as a metaphorical representation of the development of Roman identity. Jaeger's fastening on the still relatively obscure figure of the greatest ancient mathematician as a way of understanding cultural liminality in the ancient world is nothing short of a stroke of genius." ---Christina S. Kraus, Professor and Chair of Classics, Yale University "Archimedes and the Roman Imagination forms a useful addition to our understanding of Roman culture as well as of the reception of science in antiquity. It will make a genuine contribution to the discipline, not only in terms of its original interpretative claims but also as a fascinating example of how we may follow the cultural reception of historical figures." ---Reviel Netz, Professor of Classics, Stanford University Cover art: Benjamin West. Cicero Discovering the Tomb of Archimedes. Yale University Art Gallery. John Hill Morgan, B.A. 1893, LL.B. 1898, M.A. (Hon.) 1929, Fund.

This volume forms the second part of the three-volume commentary on the fragments of Diphilus, who belongs to the prominent triad of the poets of New Comedy alongside Menander and Philemon. The present volume comprises the text and an English translation of the fragments of twenty-two plays of Diphilus, followed by a full-scale (philological, thematic, literary, interpretative, historical) commentary that also yields insight into the reception of Diphilan comedy in Roman theatre. This in-depth study of the Diphilan techniques of verbal humour and performance aims at shedding light on the dramatist's distinctive place in the comic tradition, as well as showcasing a degree of variation in the overall image of the production of new comedy.

This Companion is a comprehensive introduction to Modern Money Theory (MMT), covering a wide variety of topics from the nature and origins of money, to the fundamentals of government spending and taxation, to the application of MMT in developed and developing countries.

This edited collection analyses the phenomenon of coin use for religious and ritual purposes in different cultures and across different periods of time. It proposes an engagement with the theory and interpretation of the ‘material turn’ with numismatic evidence, and an evidence-based series of discussions to offer a fuller, richer and fresh account of coin use in ritual contexts. No extensive publication has previously foregrounded coins in such a model, despite the fact that coins constitute an integrated part of the material culture of most societies today and of many in the past. Here, interdisciplinary discussions are organised around three themes: coin deposit and ritual practice, the coin as economic object and divine mediator, and the value and meaning of coin offering. Although focusing on the medieval period in Western Europe, the book includes instructive cases from the Roman period until today. The collection brings together well-established and emerging scholars from archaeology, art history, ethnology, history and numismatics, and great weight is given to material evidence which can complement and contradict the scarce written sources.

Roman monetary history has tended to focus on the study of Roman coinage but other assets regularly functioned as, or in place of, money. This book places coinage in its broader monetary context by also examining the role of bullion, financial instruments, and commodities such as grain and wine in making payments, facilitating exchange, measuring value and storing wealth. The use of such assets reduced the demand for coinage in some sectors of the economy and is a crucial factor in determining the impact of the large increase in the coin supply during the last century of the Republic. Money demand theory suggests that increased coin production led to further monetization, not per capita economic growth.

This book invites readers to enter a two-floor virtual "gallery” where 60-plus images of birds reflecting the accomplishments of human pictorial history are on display. These are works in a genre the authors term Science Art--that is, art that says something about the natural world and how it works. Darryl Wheye and Donald Kennedy show how these works of art can advance our understanding of the ways nature has been perceived over time, its current vulnerability, and our responsibility to preserve its wealth. Each room in the gallery is dedicated to a single topic. The rooms on the first floor show birds as icons, birds as resources, birds as teaching tools, and more. On the second floor, the images and their captions clarify what Science Art is and how the intertwining of art and science can change the way we look at each. The authors also provide a timeline linking scientific innovations with the production of images of birds, and they offer a checklist of steps to promote the creation and accessibility of Science Art. Readers who tour this unique and fascinating gallery will never look at art depicting nature in the same way again. Published with assistance from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation's Public Understanding of Science and Technology Program.

The papers in this volume reassess the role of coined money in the ancient Greek world. Using new approaches, the book makes the results of numismatic as well as historical research accessible to students and scholars of ancient history. The chapters provide a wide-ranging account of the political, social, and economic contexts within which coined money was used. In Part One the book focuses on the theme of monetization and the politics of coinage, while Part Two provides a series of case studies relating to the production and use of coined money in different areas of the Greek-speaking world, including Asia Minor, Egypt, and Rhodes as well as Greece itself. The individual chapters cover a broad chronological range from Archaic Greece to Roman Egypt. The book as a whole offers fresh insights into an important aspect of the ancient Greek economy.