ancient coins

Forget the proud eagle or seated Britannia of modern coins; the Greeks carried monsters in their pockets! Among the most fearsome was the Chimaera, “a lion at the front, a snake at the back, and a she-goat in the middle,” who could “breathe forth the terrible might of blazing fire” (Homer, Iliad 6.181–182). What follows is an exploration of how the Chimaera appeared on coins in antiquity….