The first such discovery in Israeli waters was a rare and “remarkably well preserved” Roman-era coin from about 1,900 years ago that featured the moon goddess Luna.
The coin was found by researchers with the Israel Antiquities Authority during digs off Haifa in northern Israel. It was produced in Alexandria, in modern-day Egypt, and depicts the Roman emperor Antoninus Pius on one side and the zodiac sign Cancer beneath Luna.
It is dated “year eight,” which refers to Antoninus Pius’s eighth year in power, which spanned from 138 to 161, during the Pax Romana period, when there was largely calm across the Roman Empire.
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The coin is one of 13 in a set that includes examples found anywhere in the world. One of the coins contains the full zodiac wheel, while another shows the 12 signs of the zodiac.
According to a statement from Jacob Sharvit, head of the IAA’s maritime archaeology team, “This is the first time a coin has been found off Israel’s coast.”
These discoveries, he continued, “have been especially well preserved; some are really uncommon, and their finding completes pieces of the historical jigsaw of the country’s past. They were lost at sea and vanish from sight for hundreds of thousands of years.
According to Sharvit, the Luna coin was discovered with a “small cache” of other coins, and the circumstances of the discovery suggested a nearby shipwreck.
