Laureate bust of Melkart right; [lion skin around neck] / Eagle standing left on prow, palm over right wing; to left, PZ (date) above club; XΣ to right, Dated CY 107 (20/19 BC). 19mm, 6.50 grams. Mint of Tyre. DCA-Tyre 397 (for shekel); HGC 10, 357 (for shekel).

From the old personal collection of Mark Fishman.

The “piece of silver” mentioned in the New Testament-most likely referring to Tyrian shekels-embodied both religious duty and cultural symbolism. Minted in the Phoenician city of Tyre, these coins bore on the obverse the deity Melqart (a local counterpart of Herakles) and on the reverse an eagle accompanied by the inscription “of Tyre the holy and inviolable.” Their high silver purity and acceptance for the Temple tax in Jerusalem made them uniquely significant and these coins widely circulated in ancient Judaea. Thus, when Judas betrayed Jesus for “thirty pieces of silver”, it was almost certainly these very coins - charged with sacrificial, monetary, and narrative weight in early Christian history.