Numismatica Ars Classica
Spring Sale 2020 25 May 2020
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From the Burel collection.
Greek Coins. Rhegium
Tetradrachm circa 415-400, AR 24 mm, 17.21 g. Lion's mask facing. Rev. PHΓINON Laureate head of Apollo r.; behind, two olive leaves. Herzfelder 95. Historia Numorum Italy 2496.
Rare. A portrait of fine style struck on sound metal, wonderful old cabinet tone. Metal
flaws on obverse, possible traces of overstriking and an area of weakness on reverse,
otherwise about extremely fine
Ex Rollin & Feuardent 11 June 1913, Burel, 45 and CNG 100, 2015, 1258 sales. From a Friend of a Scholar collection, purchased from Maison Platt in 1987.For more than a century the facing lion's scalp was a familiar sight to Greek merchants in Italy and Sicily as the badge of large-denomination silver coins of Rhegium. Initially Rhegium's trade coins were in the form of staters struck to the Euboic-Chalcidian standard, and later they became tetradrachms of the Euboic-Attic standard (such as the present coin). In both cases the choice of denomination and weight were dictated by what was commercially useful in Sicily.The portrait of a youthful, effeminate Apollo on the reverse would have been equally as familiar as the lion's scalp; indeed, they would have been considered inseparable since they had been paired for about two generations by the time this coin was struck. Its elegant appeal had supplanted the earlier reverse type of the seated figure of Iocastes, the traditional founder of the city.The major exception to the lion's scalp being the principal design on Rhegium's trade coins occurs on tetradrachms struck circa 480-462 B.C., when the tyrant Anaxilas initiated a complete overhaul of the coinage, which involved a change in design. He chose the types of a mule cart and a bounding hare, which did not long persist at Rhegium, but which became the standard design at the Sicilian city of Zancle, directly across the straits, which Anaxilas occupied and renamed Messana.
Greek Coins. Rhegium
Tetradrachm circa 415-400, AR 24 mm, 17.21 g. Lion's mask facing. Rev. PHΓINON Laureate head of Apollo r.; behind, two olive leaves. Herzfelder 95. Historia Numorum Italy 2496.
Rare. A portrait of fine style struck on sound metal, wonderful old cabinet tone. Metal
flaws on obverse, possible traces of overstriking and an area of weakness on reverse,
otherwise about extremely fine
Ex Rollin & Feuardent 11 June 1913, Burel, 45 and CNG 100, 2015, 1258 sales. From a Friend of a Scholar collection, purchased from Maison Platt in 1987.For more than a century the facing lion's scalp was a familiar sight to Greek merchants in Italy and Sicily as the badge of large-denomination silver coins of Rhegium. Initially Rhegium's trade coins were in the form of staters struck to the Euboic-Chalcidian standard, and later they became tetradrachms of the Euboic-Attic standard (such as the present coin). In both cases the choice of denomination and weight were dictated by what was commercially useful in Sicily.The portrait of a youthful, effeminate Apollo on the reverse would have been equally as familiar as the lion's scalp; indeed, they would have been considered inseparable since they had been paired for about two generations by the time this coin was struck. Its elegant appeal had supplanted the earlier reverse type of the seated figure of Iocastes, the traditional founder of the city.The major exception to the lion's scalp being the principal design on Rhegium's trade coins occurs on tetradrachms struck circa 480-462 B.C., when the tyrant Anaxilas initiated a complete overhaul of the coinage, which involved a change in design. He chose the types of a mule cart and a bounding hare, which did not long persist at Rhegium, but which became the standard design at the Sicilian city of Zancle, directly across the straits, which Anaxilas occupied and renamed Messana.