Diadem Crowns

 #Diadem #crown

Diadems and Crowns

The word diadem is often translated as crown into English from Greek however they were cloth or metal bands often decorated like this one. Notice the two holes for inserting ribbons or perhaps adjustable closures.Being gold the metal could be bent around a head 

This coin depicting Antiochus the 3rd shows a diadem actually being worn.

This last example is Phillip the 3rd wearing a very plain version of a diadem which may be an actual ribbon of cloth.

Solar Crowns

Last week and the week before  I showed you a variety of headgear worn by monarchs on coins and other art and showed you how UNLIKE modern crowns they were.

So why did later European monarchs start wearing spiked crowns rather than jewelled headbands?

One reason might have been the radiate solar crown used by some Hellenistic monarchs and LATE Empire Caesars.

The god Helios was traditionally shown wearing a crown of rays.

Hellenistic and Roman SYNCRETISM lead to people identifying Apollo or Helios with various Near Eastern and Egyptian Solar Deities. 

I suspect an attempt to identify with Horus lead to the Ptolemies using a radiate crown.

The First Caesars however did not wear crowns but the revival and spread of various Solar deities from Syria and Persia, the cults of Sol Invictus, Mithras, and Shams, and others lead to a brief revival of the radiate crown started by Aurelianus who had coins issued showing Helios on one side and his image with a radiate crown on the other.

I'm thinking also that perhaps some later jewellers were given Roman coins to melt down and remove the "pagan" imagery and were asked to recycle the coins into crowns but seing the coins and perhaps survivng mosaics or statutes of Helios got ideas.

I have more Helios art I'll share soon.