Roma Numismatics Ltd
E-Sale 81 25 Feb 2021
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Mysia, Kyzikos EL Stater. Circa 550-500 BC. Head of youthful Perseus to left, wearing the helm of Hades; tunny fish downwards behind / Quadripartite incuse square. Von Fritze 65; SNG France 193. 16.12g, 22mm.
Very Fine. Extremely Rare; one of very few known examples.
From the inventory of a German dealer.
The Kyzikene choice to include Perseus among the types for their coinage, as seen on the present lot and on the type that shows the hero kneeling to the right, holding the severed head of the slain gorgon Medusa (cf. von Fritze 162), could be seen as a respectful acknowledgement of the mythological ancestry of the Persian king, Cyrus the Great. Under Persian overlordship at the time this coin was struck, Plato tells us in his Alcibiades I (120e) that the Achaemenid Persians were descended from Achaemenes, who himself was from the line of Perseus, though this is likely a conflation of Achaemenes with Perses, son of Perseus by Andromeda. In any event, that the Greeks believed the Persians descended from the same line as Herakles made the demi-god and greatest hero from before the days of Herakles the perfect honorific to please the recent conqueror.
The child of Zeus and the mortal Danaë, the daughter of the king of Argos, the worship of Perseus was widespread among the Hellenes. In this depiction he wears here the Ἄϊδος κυνέην - the so-called Helm of Hades, which rendered its user invisible to other supernatural entities. This was given to him by Athena to help him evade the gorgons Sthenno and Euryale after he had slain and decapitated their sister Medusa. His status as a divine entity is reinforced and signalled to the viewer by the addition of wings to the cap that he wears, an archaic mythological convention instantly understandable in its time.
Very Fine. Extremely Rare; one of very few known examples.
From the inventory of a German dealer.
The Kyzikene choice to include Perseus among the types for their coinage, as seen on the present lot and on the type that shows the hero kneeling to the right, holding the severed head of the slain gorgon Medusa (cf. von Fritze 162), could be seen as a respectful acknowledgement of the mythological ancestry of the Persian king, Cyrus the Great. Under Persian overlordship at the time this coin was struck, Plato tells us in his Alcibiades I (120e) that the Achaemenid Persians were descended from Achaemenes, who himself was from the line of Perseus, though this is likely a conflation of Achaemenes with Perses, son of Perseus by Andromeda. In any event, that the Greeks believed the Persians descended from the same line as Herakles made the demi-god and greatest hero from before the days of Herakles the perfect honorific to please the recent conqueror.
The child of Zeus and the mortal Danaë, the daughter of the king of Argos, the worship of Perseus was widespread among the Hellenes. In this depiction he wears here the Ἄϊδος κυνέην - the so-called Helm of Hades, which rendered its user invisible to other supernatural entities. This was given to him by Athena to help him evade the gorgons Sthenno and Euryale after he had slain and decapitated their sister Medusa. His status as a divine entity is reinforced and signalled to the viewer by the addition of wings to the cap that he wears, an archaic mythological convention instantly understandable in its time.