Silver Tetradrachm with Heracles and Dionysus

This circa 200 BC – 100 BC Thasian silver tetradrachm (worth 4 drachmae) features a youthful and unbearded profile of Dionysus on the obverse, and a similarly unbearded Heracles standing nude with his club on the reverse. The text around Heracles reads:

“Heracles Soter of the Thasians (ΗΡΑΚΛΕΟΥΣ ΣΩΤΗΡΟΣ ΘΑΣΙΩΝ / Ηρακλεους Σωτήρος Θασίων).”

The inscription corresponds to the Gate of Heracles and Dionysus, and Heracles’ role as a Thasian protector hero-god, worthy of having his own temple in the ancient city complex.

“This title ‘Saviour’ (Sôtêr) is used…to express their power to save humans from danger, and is first attested of the Thasian Herakles in an inscription of c.300 BC listing the official religious festivals of Thasos, which include a Soteria for Herakles Saviour in the month of Anthesterion (February– March) and a Great Herakleia in Thargelion (May– June); a decree of c.350 BC adds the detail that games were held at the Herakleia.”

Stafford, Herakles, 189.

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