Tetradrachm (Coin) Portraying Demetrios I Soter (162-150 BCE, Reign of Demetrios I Soter): Artwork and History

Tetradrachm (Coin) Portraying Demetrios I Soter (162-150 BCE, Reign of Demetrios I Soter) is in the Art Institute of Chicago collection. The museum lists its creator attribution as Greek; minted in Apamea (near modern Hama, Syria).

The work and its context

The Art Institute of Chicago describes the work:

The Hellenistic period spans the nearly three hundred years between the death of Alexander the Great of Macedonia (323 BCE) and that of Cleopatra VII of Egypt (30 BCE), a descendant of one of Alexander’s generals. The term Hellenistic is derived from Hellas, an ancient Greek word for Greece. It is used to describe both chronologically and culturally the era following Alexander’s conquest of Egypt and Asia, which resulted in the spread of Greek culture across a vast area. The melding of local and Greek artistic styles with the luxurious materials captured in the conquered lands resulted in magnificent artwork, including elegant coinage. Following Alexander’s death, his empire was divided among his generals, who established independent kingdoms in Egypt; Persia; the eastern coast of the Aegean Sea, including Syria and Palestine; Greece and Macedonia; and Thrace. Almost immediately the generals began to covet each other’s land and power. The Seleucid dynasty eventually came under the thumb of Rome. As a child Demetrios (r. 162–150 BCE) was sent to Rome as a hostage to insure the good behavior of his father the king. When he finally escaped and seized his inheritance, he spent the rest of his reign in wars that made enemies of the kings of Egypt and Pergamon who saw to it that he died in battle.

Object facts

• Title: Tetradrachm (Coin) Portraying Demetrios I Soter
• Date: 162-150 BCE, Reign of Demetrios I Soter
• Artist attribution: Greek; minted in Apamea (near modern Hama, Syria)
• Place of origin: Syria
• Medium: Silver
• Dimensions: Diam.: 3.2 cm (1 5/16 in.)
• Type: Coin
• Department: Arts of Greece, Rome, and Byzantium
• Reference number: 1923.1166

Collection credit

Gift of Mrs. William Nelson Pelouze

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The description above is credited to the Art Institute of Chicago and reused under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0; HTML formatting has been converted to plain text. Other catalogue metadata and the public-domain image are provided under CC0 1.0.