The illuminating albeit detached glare of Athena's owl, one of the most sacred symbols in archaic Greece has been magnificently portrayed by skilled artisans in our workshop over 40 years ago.
The symbolism of the owl was virtue and Wisdom. The owl was usually depicted accompanying the virgin Goddess Athena, to whom perhaps the most significant shrine of classical antiquity, the Parthenon, was built in honor of. Worship towards Athene peaked during the golden age of Pericles (aprox 461 BC to 379 BC). During this inspiring age of wisdom that philosophy, architecture, medicine, theatre and the arts first became a fabric to society to set grounds to an array of social fundaments as they are today, whilst the radical concept of democracy was also established.
In tribute, for the wisdom that had helped humanity reach new horizons of civilization, the owl was depicted on various denominations of the tetradrachm in the 5th Century BC to reach every part of the known world and spread its important meaning. Today, more than 2 millenia later, this owl still has it's honorary place on the Greek 1 Euro coin.