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Ancient Greek Coinage
Lucania, Herakleia
Ca. 433-330 BC
Silver Diobol 12mm, 1.10gm. Very Small Coin--a Dime is 17.9mm
Rare Variety
Obverse: Athena with Attic helmet to right, ornamented with Hippocamp (Winged sea horse-serpent).
Reverse: depicts the first of the Twelve labors of Herakles ~ Herakles kneeling left, strangling the Nemean
lion with left with both hands/arms; EY - HRA above. The left facing Herakles type is much rarer than its right facing counterparts.
Ref. Van Keuren 59; SNG ANS 40; HN Italy 1379.
Very Fine. much nicer in hand~Small coin shown greatly enlarged.
The Twelve Labors of Herakles
The Twelve Labors of Herakles is a myth about the labors that Herakles (Hercules) had to perform as a part of his sentence after killing his own children.
Being one of the offsprings of Zeus’ affairs, Herakles has always been subject of Hera’s hatred. Hera tried to kill Herakles many times throughout his adventures or at the very least made everything in her power to torture him. It was one of those times when Hera made Herakles lose his mind temporarily and Herakles killed his own children during this craze. After a short while he was awakened from his state of madness and realized what he did in great sorrow and regret. He sought guidance from Apollo and was told by Apollo’s oracle that his punishment would be serving his cousin and archenemy, Eurystheus, the king of Mycenae and Tiryns for twelve years.
Herakles was assigned to perform twelve labors/tasks which were considered almost impossible to be fulfilled. However, Herakles managed to perform these labors successfully thanks to the help he got from Athena and Hermes. Having performed these labors was, indeed, the reason why Herakles has been rewarded with immortality in the end.
First Labor: Killing the Nemean Lion
The first labor Eurystheus assigned Herakles to was slaying the Nemean Lion and bringing back his skin. The Nemean lion was a very powerful beast born from Typhon and Echidna. It was a beast that could only be harmed by human hand and no other weapon could hurt it. Herakles realized that the beast was invulnerable after shooting him with an arrow and he went into the cave the beast lived in, held his neck tight and choked the Nemean Lion to the death. Herakles brought back the lion’s skin to Eurystheus and set on to fulfill his second task.
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