Hercules Deusoniensis

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Coin image of Hercules Deusoniensis

Hercules Deusoniensis is the name of a Germanic god that has only been passed down through Roman coinage of the emperor Postumus from the period between 260 and 268. This Hercules is interpreted as a local appearance of Donar or Thor .

Lore

Representations of the god with his name can be found on numerous coin issues of the Postumus, minted in the mints of the Gallic special empire in Cologne and Lyon , of different values, especially antoninians . The pictorial representation corresponds to the classic motif of Herakles / Hercules as a naked athletic-muscular man armed with a club and wearing a lion skin with the varying attributes club, bow and arrow. In one type of coin, the deity is shown in a four-columned aedicula , which probably means a temple, with a club and a lion's skin. There is also an embossing that shows the shoulder bust of Hercules with a lion's skin and club, as well as several embossings depicting the god's head with a laurel wreath. The coin legends vary: HER DEVSONIENS , HERC DEVSENIENSI , HERC DEVSONIENSI and, for some coin types, the full form HERCULI DEVSONIENSI .

Epithet and interpretation

In general, it is true in research that the nickname Deusoniensis is a derivation of a toponym , a place name Deuso , Deusone . In the historical tradition of late antiquity or the migration period , this place name is mentioned in the Chronicon of Jerome in connection with a battle in 373 and the defeat of an army of the Saxons in the settlement area of ​​the Franks .

"Saxones caesi Deusone in regione Francorum"

Of the numerous attempts at localization that were made due to the limited historical tradition, only two places in the Netherlands are still being discussed as serious possibilities: Doesburg in Gelderland and Dissen near Tilburg in Noord-Brabant . BH Stolte and Heinrich Tiefenbach prefer Dissen . The motives of the Postumus, who partly resided in Cologne, and the circumstances of honoring or venerating the native Germanic Hercules are not known. Numerous researchers, including Reinhard Wenskus , suggests that the close relationship between Postumus and the "Hercules from Deuso" is thus justifiable that he in Deuso to Gegenkaiser was proclaimed. Christoph Reichmann suspects that the strong contingents of Germanic auxiliary troops that supported his political power could have had an influence. Reichmann further interprets a podium stamp that was found in Elfrath , as a local cult site used since the 1st century, which was expanded under Postumus to a cult area dedicated to Hercules Deusoniensis with a regional central importance. Reichmann emmends - reserved in the research - an inscription fragment found on site of a presumed votive stone (side piece with approach in the upper area of ​​the cornice of a volute and a gable) as:

"(Her · De) us / (oniens) i / [...] o / [...] s"

The historian Reinhard Wenskus sees the pictorial representation of Hercules on the coins as evidence or evidence that this Hercules is a Germanic, i.e. Donar or Thor, because explicit deviations from the classic representation of the Mediterranean Hercules can be identified. On these coins, Hercules is shown, contrary to the typical image, dressed in a bear's skin instead of a lion's skin. Wenskus points to the parallel later Nordic literary tradition, in which Thor is nicknamed Björn = the bear . From the point of view of most numismatists and archaeologists, however, Hercules is depicted with the lion's skin on all coins; there are no differences to other depictions of the Roman Hercules. Ton Derks equates the Hercules Deusoniensis with the Batavian Hercules Magusanus .

literature

Web links

Remarks

  1. ^ Georg Elmer : The coinage of the Gallic emperors in Cologne, Trier and Milan . In: Bonner Jahrbücher 146, 1941, 40–45 No. 118a. 124, 184, 217-226. 304 394. Pl. 2, 18.3, 17; Pierre Bastien: Le monnaye de bronze de postume . Wetteren 1967, 115 No. 1. 151 No. 103; 159 No. 132.
  2. ^ Georg Elmer: The coinage of the Gallic emperors in Cologne, Trier and Milan . In: Bonner Jahrbücher 146, 1941, 46 No. 316 Plates 5, 3; Pierre Bastien: Le monnaye de bronze de postume . Wetteren 1967, 171 no. 167 plate 34; Heinz-Joachim Schulzki: The Antonine coinage of the Gallic emperors from Postumus to Tetricius . Bonn 1996, 52 No. 26 plate 3.
  3. ^ Georg Elmer: The coinage of the Gallic emperors in Cologne, Trier and Milan . In: Bonner Jahrbücher 146, 1941, Supplement VIII 2 No. 544-549.
  4. ^ Georg Elmer: The coinage of the Gallic emperors in Cologne, Trier and Milan . In: Bonner Jahrbücher 146, 1941, 42 No. 183; 47 No. 324-325 Pl. 5, 4.
  5. ↑ Hieronymus, Chronicon 2389.
  6. ↑ Authors who name the place and the event such as B. Cassiodor , Fredegar and others are dependent on the position with Hieronymus, s. BH Stolte:  Deusone. In: Reallexikon der Germanischen Altertumskunde (RGA). 2nd Edition. Volume 5, Walter de Gruyter, Berlin / New York 1984, ISBN 3-11-009635-8 , p. 344.
  7. ↑ Wolfgang Spickermann: Cult organization and cult functionaries in the area of ​​Colonia Ulpia Traiana. In: Thomas Grünewald (Ed.): Germania inferior (= Reallexikon der Germanischen Altertumskunde - supplementary volumes, Volume 28). Walter de Gruyter, Berlin / New York 2000, pp. 212-240; here 216.
  8. ↑ Christoph Reichmann: The sanctuary in Krefeld-Elfrath. Figure 10, document page 11.
  9. ↑ Gerd Biegel: The Cologne mint in the time of the Gallic Empire . In: Rise and Fall of the Roman World II, 4, 1975, pp. 755f.
  10. ↑ Gerhard Bauchhenß:  Herakles / Hercules (in peripheria Occidentalis) . In: Lexicon Iconographicum Mythologiae Classicae (LIMC). Supplementum 2009, Düsseldorf 2009, pp. 271-272. No. add 16-22.
  11. ^ Ton Derks: Gods, Temples and Ritual Practices. The transformation of religious ideas and values ​​in Roman Gaul. (= Amsterdam Archeological Studies, 2). Amsterdam University Press, Amsterdam 1998, ISBN 90-5356-254-0 , pp. 25f.