Unchanged by any teller — how the centuries since have seen Oxylus.
The gallery
Stater of Elis for the Olympic Festivals (eagle and thunderbolt)
Unknown, 5th century BC
A silver stater struck by Elis, the Peloponnesian kingdom that mythic tradition credits Oxylus with founding after the Return of the Heraclids. There is no surviving ancient portrait of Oxylus himself; the coinage of his realm is the closest material legacy of his foundation. The obverse shows an eagle with spread wings perched on an olive branch, and the reverse a thunderbolt (fulmen) - both emblems of Olympian Zeus, whose great sanctuary at Olympia lay within Elean territory and whose festival Elis administered. Now in the Cleveland Museum of Art (acc. 1916.995).
Silver stater of Elis-Olympia (eagle seizing a hare; Nike)
Unknown, 432-421 BC
A Classical-period silver stater of Elis, the land Oxylus the Aetolian asked for as his reward for guiding the sons of Aristomachus across to the Peloponnese (Pausanias 5.3.6-5.4.2). The obverse depicts an eagle - the bird of Zeus of Olympia - clutching a hare, while the reverse bears a striding figure of Nike, the goddess of victory presiding over the Olympic games held in Oxylus' kingdom. Standing in for any direct image of the hero, the coin embodies the prestige and divine patronage of the Elean state he is said to have established. Munzkabinett, Berlin.