Watch List notes:

GREEK COINS
KYRENAICA

Kyrene. Circa 520/500 BC. Tetradrachm (Silver, 21mm, 17.13 g 7). The nymph Kyrene, wearing a chiton and a flat stephane, seated left on a diphros, its seat covered by a cloth, her right hand outstretched towards a silphium plant on the left, and her left resting in her lap; behind her to right, silphium fruit. Rev. Forepart of Pegasos to right; all within a dotted border inside a shallow incuse square. BMC 12. Cf. Kunstfreund 14 (same obverse die). Extremely rare, the finest of the three known examples). Lightly toned. Very fine.

From the Battos collection.
This coin bears what is quite probably the most intriguing obverse type ever to appear on a Greek coin. One of the great sources for the riches of Kyrene was the plant known as silphium: it was used as a food, but primarily as a medicine, which had a wide variety of functions. It was a pain killer and a remedy for epilepsy, but was especially renowned as a means of birth control. The nymph on the obverse of this coin has been explained as celebrating that function: her left hand, resting in her lap, is thought to be a clear indication of the way silphium enabled women to control their own fertility (the fact that her right hand is touching the plant and a fruit is behind her seems to emphasize that connection).