Both birth control and abortion were common practices in the Ancient Mediterranean world. Although many examples of imperfect methods exist in our sources, (for instance, in the fourth century BCE Hyppocrates suggested that prostitutes wanting to abort should jump up and down, slamming their heels into their glutes) there were effective ways of ending or preventing pregnancy. The coin pictured here is from the island of Cyrene, and the plant depicted on it was called silphium. Silphium was so effective that it dominated Cyrene’s economy, and in such high demand that the plant eventually became extinct.
