Discovery Sites: Hephaistos Islands

FlagsThasos BannerWine in MythologyWine Falsification

(Behind the Scenes)

Created by Nika Rukavishnikova for each of the twenty-seven regions in Assassin's Creed Odyssey, the flags represent the color and iconography of their region. For example, Athens is easily identifiable as the blue banner with the owl symbol. Krete shows the bull head, and Sparta the rich red with a gold lambda. The flags also denote the export or main industry of that region. A lot of historical research was referenced for these designs, particularly from coins of the period and region.

Herakles, wearing lion skin, kneeling right, drawing bow, reverse type of a tetradrachm of Thasos / 390-335 BCE (Classical Greece)

The banner of Thasos depicts the head of Herakles, inspired by the area's coinage. Herakles had an important sanctuary the city and was the hero-protector of Thasos.

He is shown wearing a lion-skin headdress—the scalp of the Nemean lion he killed with his bare hands.

The iconography of the coin itself is a precise copy of a relief of the gate of Herakles, one of the entrances to the city. All gates were decorated by reliefs—there was also a gate of Hermes, a gate of Zeus, and a gate of the Silenos, amongst others.

The gate of Herakles led to the Herakleion, the sanctuary dedicated to him.

Tetradrachm of Mende (Makedonia) depicting inebriated Dionysos holding a kantharos and reclining on his donkey, with grape clusters on the other side / 460-423 BCE (Classical Greece)

Euripides's "Bacchae" features the tale of how the god Dionysos introduced wine to Attika.

The story goes that Dionysos found hospitality in the home of lkarios and his daughter Erigone. During his stay, Dionysos showed his mortal host how to cultivate vine plants and turn their fruit into wine.

Later, Ikarios gave his wine to some shepherds. Not used to the feeling of drunkenness, the shepherds thought that lkarios had poisoned them, and killed him in response. Stricken with grief for the death of her father, Erigone hung herself from the branches of the tree that stood where her father was buried.

Terracotta amphora handle stamped with the name Herakleon and a stylized bunch of grapes / 2nd-cent. BCE (Hellenstic Greece)

Thasian wine was very popular in the Greek world, and it was in such high-demand that adulteration and imitation wines became major issues.

To combat these issues, a law was established by the citizens and landowners of Thasos that forbid any foreign wine from entering Thasian territory. They also prohibited the selling of wine in jugs or cups, to ensure that wine could only be sold in properly labelled amphoras or pithoi marked with a stamp of authenticity.

Below is text from a stele outlining the details of the law:

"No Thasian ship shall import foreign wine within Athos and Pacheia; if it does, the owner shall be Liable to the same penalties as for adulterating the wine with water, and the helmsman shall be liable to the same penalty...Nor shall anyone sell wine by the kotyle either from amphoras or from a cask or from a false [unlabeled] pithos; and whoever sells it, the lawsuits and the deposits and the penalties shall be the same as for adulterating it with water."