Athsho (Hephaistos) - Fire God

CNG 105, Lot: 545. Estimate $4000. Sold for $8000. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

INDIA, Kushan Empire. Huvishka. Circa AD 152-192. AV Dinar (20mm, 7.98 g, 12h). Main mint in Baktria (Balkh?). Late phase. ÞαO(retrograde h)α(retrograde h)OÞαO OO hÞVI VOÞα(retrograde h)O, nimbate, diademed, and crowned half-length bust left on clouds, holding mace-scepter and filleted spear over shoulder / αΘOÞO, Athsho standing right, flames about head and shoulders, holding blacksmith’s hammer over shoulder and pair of tongs; tamgha to left. MK 230 (unlisted dies); ANS Kushan –; Donum Burns 252. EF, scuffs along part of edge. Rare and choice.

The god Athsho, or Athosho, appears to derive from the Zoroastrian deity Atar, the son of Ahura Mazda and the personification of holy fire, indicated by the flames about Athsho’s head and shoulders. Associated with Aša-Vahišta, the personification of truth or righteousness, who appears as Ashaeixsho on coins of Huvishka, the figure of Atar has been employed historically for royal fires. While recognized in Iran as a deity, who admitted or rejected souls in heaven, Athsho was mostly closely associated in western Mithraism with Hephaistos. The blacksmith’s hammer and tongs, symbols of Hephaistos, were also used as tools for igniting the holy fire (Venidad XIV.7), thus associating them also with Athsho. Likewise, in Pahlavi commentary on the Atašnyayiš (Sacred Books of the East XXIII:360, note 6) notes the further connection between these two gods in that, like Hephaistos, Athsho “bodily is infirm; spiritually he is a warrior.”