This is attested by two inscriptions, one from Delphi and one from Athens.[10]
Epigrams
Palatine Anthology is a 10th-century manuscript containing a collection of Greek poems and epigrams from the 7th century BC on. Two of the epigrams probably refer to Echedemos.
In one poem, in which Echedemos is still a boy "in his prime", the poet is in love and steals a kiss from him:[12]
As Echedemus was peeping out of his door on the sly, I slyly kissed that charming boy who is just in his prime. Now I am in dread, for he came to me in a dream, bearing a quiver, and departed after giving me fighting cocks, but at one time smiling, at another with no friendly look. But have I touched a swarm of bees, and a nettle, and fire?
The poet's dread has been interpreted as referring to the high social status and power of Echedemos's family, who could cause considerable harm to the poet if his advances were judged too bold.[13]
In the second poem, in which Echedemos has grown up, he is given a much more elaborate set of compliments:[14]
Child of Leto, son of Zeus the great, who utterest oracles to all men, thou art lord of the sea-girt height of Delos; but the lord of the land of Cecrops is Echedemus, a second Attic Phoebus, whom soft-haired Love lit with lovely bloom. And his city Athens, once mistress of the sea and land, now has made all Greece her slave by beauty.
Here, he is called "a second Attic Phoebus", Phoebus (literally "radiant") being a common epithet of Apollo. This comparison is certainly a reference to his beauty, but could also refer to a personal device he later stamped on Athenian coins. Echedemos is also called "the lord of the land of Cecrops", i.e. lord of Athens, indicating his high social standing and wealth. Two final lines, lamenting the former glory of Athens, indicate the date for the epigram in the beginning of the 2nd century BC when ever waning power of Athens allowed Romans to increase their influence in Greece and broader Hellenistic world (conflict with Aetolians being one example).[15]
Coinage
An example of a New Style tetradrachm, packed with additional inscriptions and symbols.
Some time in the second century BC Athens have established a new iconography of coinage, with obverse featuring a head of Athena and reverse showing an owl with additional images, symbols and inscriptions identifying, among other things, the people responsible for minting the coins.[16]
Among these Athenian New Style coins there is a whole series bearing letters EXE on the reverse, possibly dating from 170–169 BC.[17] These have been cited as a proof that Echedemos was the Athenian mint master at the time.[18][19] The office of the mint master was given almost exclusively to members of the Athenian aristocracy, conferring the almost royal honour to place one's name and emblem on the city's coins.[20]
Below the monogram, the coins bear a small device of a head or bust of Helios, with a crown of rays above seemingly rich curly voluminous hair. This emblem could be an allusion to the fair looks of Echedemos, paralleling the comparison to Apollo in an epigram by Artemon.[21]
The portrait is a garnetintaglio of circa 220 BC.[23][24][25] It is set into an original elaborate gold swivel ring.[26][27] The work can be confidently dated as it is signed by engraver Apollonios (ΑΠΟΛΛΩΝΙΟ[Σ or Υ]),[28] who also carved and signed a portrait of a very young Antiochus III (also called Antiochus the Great, ruled Seleucid Empire in 222–187 BC).[29][30][31] Apollonios might have also been responsible for making coin dies for Antiochus III, as some of his coins bear monogram ΑΠΟ,[32][33] although this is controversial.[34] Several seal impressions — one of Antiochus III,[35] one of Antiochus IV,[36] and six of an unknown nobleman[37] — excavated in Seleucia on the Tigris in modern Iraq, all unsigned, have been ascribed to Apollonios or his circle on stylistic grounds.[38][39] Influence of his work has been deduced in coins of Antiochus III minted in Antiokheia.[40] Apollonios was certainly an engraver of the first rank,[41] but nothing else is known about him as his is a very common name.[42][43][44] He has been hypothesized to be an Athenian who worked for some time in the Seleucid and possibly other Hellenistic courts.[45]
Dating of the ring to around 220 BC agrees with what is known about Echedemos. His two sons were born circa 200 BC, so twenty years earlier he must have been fairly young.[46]
Remarkably, two ancient partial impressions of this (or a very similar) ring have been excavated in Aetolian Kallipolis,[47][48] near modern Lidoriki in Greece.[49] They were found, among many other portraits, in the clay sealings from the "House of the Archives" that was burnt down, along with the whole city, shortly after the Battle of Pydna in 168 BC.[50] They come from the correspondence between two prominent Aetolian generals (Agetas Lochagou and Lochagos Ageta) and important people of the time,[51] including Roman general Scipio Africanus.[52]
The ring was reportedly found at Panticapaeum (modern Kerch) in the Crimea.[53][54][55] If this is indeed the case, there are several ways it could get from Athens to the Bosporus. Athens partly depended in its grain supply on the colonies of the Black Sea, and Echedemos could have sent the ring as a present to a king, a dignitary or even a merchant in the area during trade negotiations.[56] Alternatively, it could travel back home with mercenaries of the northern Black Sea coast, who are known to have served all over Hellenistic world, even as far as Ptolemaic Egypt.[57]
Identification is by no means concrete. Other suggestions include: an uncertain, perhaps Bosporan, king;[58] a royal courtier,[23][59] possibly Hermeias, the chief minister of Seleucus III;[60] and, given the absence of any insignia, a private individual.[61] Older identification as Bosporan king Asander[62] (110–17 BC, ruled 44–17 BC) has since been disproven.[63]
^Chronology of the Athenian New Style coinage remains somewhat uncertain, see Mattingly 1990; another date suggested for the coins is 137–136 BC or 135–134 BC, in this case EXE could refer to a later member of the same family, Echedemos son of Arketos, Kydathenaieus, and the head of Helios could be a family emblem, see Pantos 1989, p. 284; this Echedemos (Ἐχέδημος Ἀρκέτου) is known from an inscription of circa 155–154 BC as a victor at the festival of Theseia, see: Pantos 1989, pp. 284–285, fn. 49; Inscriptiones GraecaeIG II² 958
^The stone is specifically a pyrope, 2.6 x 2.3 cm, see: Vollenweider 1980, p. 153; Pantos 1989, p. 278, fn. 8; Gross 2008 p. 57, fn. 47
^Photo of the intaglio's impression is published in: Furtwängler 1900, I, pl. LXIII:36; Hill 1943, p. 62, fig. 3; Vollenweider 1980, pl. 40:3a,3b; Pantos 1989, pl. 49:d; Gross 2008, p. 187, pl. 2:3; Messina 2012, p. 122, fig. 2
^Vollenweider 1980, pp. 151–152; Pantos 1989, pp. 278–279; Gross 2008, p. 134, cat. II 6; the identification of these two rings as by the same master has recently been questioned, see Messina 2012
^The signed intaglio portrait is on a bezel, from a seal or a ring, in the National Museum, Athens, inv. 594, see: Gross 2008, p. 134, cat. II 6; Messina 2012, p. 121; the stone is variously described as a garnet (pyrope) or a carnelian, diameter as 1.9 cm or 2.1 cm, see: Vollenweider 1980, p. 153; Gross 2008, p. 134, cat. II 6; Messina 2012, p. 121, fn. 2; photos of the stone published in: Vollenweider 1980, pl. 40:2; Gross 2008, p. 187 pl. 2:2; Messina 2012, p. 121, fig. 1; photos of the impression published in: Vollenweider 1980, pl. 40:2a,2b; Gross 2008, p. 187, pl. 2:1; Messina 2012, p. 121, fig. 1
^The subject can be confidently identified by comparison with the coins issued circa 223–213 BC, see Gross 2008, p. 38; some doubts have occasionally been expressed, see Messina 2012, p. 121, fn. 4; Antiochus III was just 18 when he assumed the throne, which agrees well with the portrait being made circa 220 BC, see Pantos 1989, p. 287
^Vollenweider 1980, p. 151, fn. 29; Pantos 1989, p. 287
^Photos of a tetradrachm from a mint in Nisibis (Mesopotamia, modern Turkey), now in Hunterian Museum, Glasgow, are published in: Vollenweider 1980, pl. 39:3a; Messina 2012, p. 122, fig. 2
^Seal size over 1.9 x 1.7 cm, impression kept in Iraq Museum, Baghdad, see Messina 2012, p. 123, p.124, fn. 15; photo published in Messina 2012, p. 123, fig. 4a
^Seal size over 2.1 x 1.9 cm, impression kept in Iraq Museum, Baghdad, see Messina 2012, p. 123, p.124, fn. 15; photo published in Messina 2012, p. 123, fig. 4b
^These are particularly well impressed and preserved. Seal size over 1.8 x 1.6 cm, all impressions kept in Iraq Museum, Baghdad, see Messina 2012, p.124; photos of one of the impressions are published in Messina 2012, p. 123, fig. 4c, and on the catalogue book cover
^The impressions come from the archive building of Seleucis, where over 25,000 clay sealings have been found, dated to the 3rd and 2nd centuries BC using the ruler portraits and stamps of the salt tax department, see Messina 2012, p.121
^Another engraver of the same name but working at a later period is known from several signed works, see Richter 1956, pp. XXXVI–XXXVII; one low-quality portrait seal impression from Seleucia on the Tigris is signed "ΑΠΟΛΛ[Ο or Ω][...]" in reverse, although it could also be the name of the owner, see Messina 2012, p. 124, fig.5, p.125; Athens produced many sculptors with this name, see: Pantos 1989, p. 287; Messina 2012, p. 123, fn. 13; the famous Belvedere Torso is prominently signed "Apollonios, son of Nestor, Athenian"; the bronze Boxer of Quirinal is also signed "Apollonios, son of Nestor", see Messina 2012, p. 123, fn. 13; finally, Pliny the Elder ascribed the monumental Farnese Bull to a certain Apollonios of Tralles and his brother Tauriscus
^Even the two signed portraits under discussion have been suggested as works of two different contemporaneous engravers of the same name, see Messina 2012
^Pantos 1989, p. 288; Gross 2008, p. 39; Spier 1991, p. 91
^The sealings are preserved in the Delphi Museum: inv. no. 14524, 1.7 x 1.35 cm, and inv. no. 14525, 1.3 x 1.4 cm, see Pantos 1989, p. 278, fn. 5, 8; for photographs, see Pantos 1989, p. 279, fig. 1, and pl. 49:a,b
^Portrait on a sealing in the archive has been identified with the man engraved on a gold signet ring in National Museum, Naples, who in turn has been identified as Scipio via numismatic parallels, see: Pantos 1989, p. 281; Ruebel 1991, p. 18; this identification is widely accepted, but has been doubted, see Ruebel 1991, p. 19; a portrait ring of Scopio is mentioned by Valerius Maximus, who writes about Scopio's son Lucius: "and they pulled his ring from his hand, on which the head of Africanus had been molded", see Ruebel 1991, p. 29, fn. 38; the ring in Naples is 3.0 x 3.5 cm, see Richter 1955, pl. VI, fig. 22; it is signed by engraver Herakleidas, see: Richter 1955, p. 44; Pantos 1989, p. 281; Ruebel 1991, p. 29, fn. 37; it was found in Capua, see: Richter 1955, p. 44; Ruebel 1991, p. 18; photo of an impression is published in Furtwängler 1900, I, pl. XXXIII:15; photos of the ring are published in Richter 1955, pl. VI, fig. 22, and on the museum websiteArchived 2014-07-14 at the Wayback Machine (inv. no. 25085)
^Furtwängler 1900, II, p. 285; Hill 1943, p. 62, fig.3 + fn. 1; Spier 1989, p. 29, cat. A; Gross 2008, p. 57, fn. 47; Messina 2012, p. 122; this provenance is uncertain, information about the findspot comes from a London auction catalogue of 1898, see Pantos 1989, p. 286, fn. 53
^The stone is very well preserved which suggests that it was put in a grave when still almost new, see Hill 1943, p. 62
^Portrait ring of Antiochus III is of unknown provenance, see: Pantos 1989, p. 287, fn. 65; Messina 2012, p. 121
^Pantos 1989, p. 287; many rings with the portraits of the Ptolemies found on northern shores of the Black Sea could have gotten there this way, see Pantos 1989, p. 287, fn. 60
^If "Apollonios" refers to the owner and not the engraver, which is also a possibility, literary and epigraphic sources provide dozens of Seleucid philoi or courtiers of this name, see Messina 2012, p.125
Dorothy Kent Hill (1943). "Some Hellenistic Carved Gems". The Journal of the Walters Art Gallery. 6: 60–69.
David Malcolm Lewis (1962). "The chronology of the Athenian New Style coinage". The Numismatic Chronicle and Journal of the Royal Numismatic Society. 7 (2): 275–300.
Harold B. Mattingly[in German] (1990). "The Beginning of Athenian New Style Silver Coinage". The Numismatic Chronicle. 150: 67–78.
Marie-Louise Vollenweider (1980). "Deux portraits inconnus de la dynastie du Pont et les graveurs Nikias, Zoilos et Apollonios". Antike Kunst. 23 (2): 146–153.
