Troas, Ilion. Memnon of Rhodes AR Reduced Drachm(?). Chian standard, circa 350-340 BC. Head of Athena to right, wearing crested Attic helmet decorated with palmette / Archaic xoanon of Athena Ilias standing to left on base, with polos on head, holding filleted spear pointing downwards and distaff, rose to lower left; all within [shallow circular incuse]. A. Ellis-Evans, "Memnon and Mentor of Rhodes in the Troad" in NC 178 (2018), Pl. 6, 6 (O1/R1 - same dies); Jameson 2229 (same dies); CNG 99, lot 195 (same); Hirsch 258, lot 2208 (same obv. die); Gorny & Mosch 108, lot 1234. 2.78g, 15mm, 12h.

Good Very Fine; slight flatness to rev., light porosity. Extremely Rare, one of seven known examples (of the other six, four are in private hands, one in the ANS [no. 1951.191.20 - the Jameson piece] and one in Berlin [18262099]).

Known from a very few drachms and hemidrachms, the attribution of this issue is perplexing; originally thought to be from Assos on the basis of the similarity of the types to a single tetradrachm in the Bibliothèque nationale de France (Traité II 2302, pl. CLXIII, 28), parallels can also be drawn with the early bronzes of Ilium.

In his 2018 paper in the Numismatic Chronicle ("Memnon and Mentor of Rhodes in the Troad", NC 178), Aneurin Ellis-Evans makes a convincing case for these anepigraphic issues to be the first silver coins issued at Ilion, a hypothesis first posited by Lorenzo Lazzarini in 1984 ("La prima monetazione della Panegiria a Ilio", RIN 85). Ellis-Evans dates them to the 350s BC under the auspices of Memnon of Rhodes, showing how these issues become the precursor to the creation of the Koinon of Athena Ilias.