Extract

Architecture, coinage, and funerary remains reflect distinctive Jewish modes of participation in the larger visual culture of the Graeco-Roman period. Jews tended to distance themselves from artefacts and imagery deemed potentially 'idolatrous', although this category was somewhat fluid. *Hasmonaean and Jewish revolt coinage exhibits mainly floral motifs and a palaeo-Hebrew script, reminiscent of Tyrian numismatics. The Temple menorah and showbread table appear on lepta of Antigonos Mattathias (39 bce), and other Jerusalem cult objects are found on coins of the First Revolt (66–74 ce) and the Bar Kokhba Revolt (132–5 ce), which bear a tetrastyle representation of the lost Temple. The architecture of Herod's Temple (c.20/19 bce – 70 ce) was consonant with Augustan imperial architecture, apart from the avoidance of human and most animal imagery. From the 3rd cent. ce, symbols drawn from the Temple cult (e.g. the menorah), some of which were carried over into *synagogue liturgy (e.