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Lydian Moon God - Meis Axiottenos

  • Writer: sulla80
    sulla80
  • Sep 6, 2020
  • 3 min read

Updated: Aug 22


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Mên, illustrated in this marble Roman relief from the 2nd Century AD, is the Moon god of Roman Anatolia, perhaps connected with the Mesopotamian moon god Sin which was also a male lunar god. The Roman Luna was female. The deity is portrayed with a crescent moon behind his shoulders and wearing a phrygian cap. Strabo describes a temple of Mên of Pharnaces:


"And the kings revered this temple so exceedingly that they proclaimed the "royal" oath as follows: "By the Fortune of the king and by Mēn of Pharnaces." And this is also the temple of Selenê, like that among the Albanians and those in Phrygia, I mean that of Mēn in the place of the same name and that of Mên Ascaeus near the Antiocheia that is near Pisidia and that of Mēn in the country of the Antiocheians."
 -Strabo, Geography XII p.557 

Meis Axiottenos is the local Lydian manifestation of this deity. Saitta (Saittai) lay in central Lydia, between the upper Hermus (Gediz) and its tributary the Hyllus. Ancient literary descriptions of the landscape center on the wider district called Katakekaumene (“the Burnt [Land]”), a treeless, volcanic tract famous for its wine. Strabo notes that this country produces a celebrated vintage and ascribes the scorched ground to long‑spent subterranean fire - his way of explaining the black lavas and cinders we now associate with the Kula volcanic field.


Under Rome it belonged to the province of Asia and expressed civic identity through bronze issues like this one. In the reign of Septimius Severus (AD 193-211) municipal coinage expressed local cult and pride under imperial sovereignty. The map below shows roughly the location of ancient Axiotta where there was a sanctuary of Meis Artemidorou Axiottenos and his mother, "Great Mother".(*)

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Stelae, inscribed stone slabs or columns, have been found that “both advertise a divinity’s power and warn others either explicitly or implicitly against committing a religious transgression, which is accomplished by recounting how a worshiper had suffered an ailment that was believed to be linked to an offense against the god or goddess, and which only had disappeared after proper amends had been made”(*).


This rare coin from Saitta, Lydia (near modern İcikler, Türkiye), depicts Mēn Axiottenos on the obverse and Apollo on the reverse. Saitta (CAITTHNΩN) is the only city to use Axiottenos (AΞIOTTENOΣ) together with the god's bust on its coins (*).

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Saitta, Lydia, Pseudo-autonomous, AE17, 1/3 Assarion, time of Septimius Severus, 193-211 AD

Obv: Bust of Mên Axiottenos on crescent right, wearing Phrygian cap

Rev: CAITTHNΩN, Apollo standing facing, head to left, holding branch in his right hand and leaning left on bow set on ground

Size: 2.26g, 16.3mm

Ref: SNG von Aulock -; SNG Copenhagen -; BMC 17; Lindgren I 789; Asia Minor Coins Online AMCO #6106

Note: AMCO states that the Lindgren coins share the same dies as this coin, as does this one at wildwinds. Although the photo isn't great - 789 dies do look the same to me. I haven't seen a nicer example than my coin, so far.


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References:

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