Roma Numismatics Ltd
Auction XXV 22-23 Sep 2022
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Bruttium, Rhegion AR Tetradrachm. Anaxilas, Tyrant. Circa 478-476 BC. Mule biga driven to right by seated male charioteer; laurel leaf in exergue / Hare springing to right, RECION (retrograde) around. Caltabiano Series IIB, 99A (D50/R56); SNG Cambridge 831 (same dies); SNG ANS 625-631; HN Italy 2472; HGC 1, 1632. 17.32g, 26mm, 1h.
Good Very Fine; pleasant cabinet tone with underlying lustre.
From the David Freedman Collection;
Privately purchased from Art Ancient Ltd, 2 July 2016.
Proclaiming himself tyrant of Rhegion in 494 BC, Anaxilas encouraged Samian and other Ionian refugees fleeing west from the Achaemenid Persians to seize Zankle from its absent ruler Skythes. Soon thereafter he besieged Zankle himself and expelled the Samians, populating the city instead with settlers from his native Messene. Renaming the city Messana, Anaxilas left control of Rhegion to his son Leophron and remained in Messana.
The biga/hare tetradrachm was the innovation of Anaxilas himself, who soon after conquering Messana began a joint issue of Attic weight coinage from both Rhegion and Messana bearing the same types. We learn from Aristotle that Anaxilas won the mule-biga race at the Olympic games in either 484 or 480, and commemorates it here on his coinage. The use of the hare is almost certainly a joint reference to the abundance of the animal in the vicinity of Rhegion (according to Aristotle, Anaxilas is supposed to have also introduced it to Sicily), and to the cult of Pan that flourished among the Messenians. This hypothesis is supported by the presence of a head identified as Pan as an adjunct to the hare on later tetradrachms of Messana.
Good Very Fine; pleasant cabinet tone with underlying lustre.
From the David Freedman Collection;
Privately purchased from Art Ancient Ltd, 2 July 2016.
Proclaiming himself tyrant of Rhegion in 494 BC, Anaxilas encouraged Samian and other Ionian refugees fleeing west from the Achaemenid Persians to seize Zankle from its absent ruler Skythes. Soon thereafter he besieged Zankle himself and expelled the Samians, populating the city instead with settlers from his native Messene. Renaming the city Messana, Anaxilas left control of Rhegion to his son Leophron and remained in Messana.
The biga/hare tetradrachm was the innovation of Anaxilas himself, who soon after conquering Messana began a joint issue of Attic weight coinage from both Rhegion and Messana bearing the same types. We learn from Aristotle that Anaxilas won the mule-biga race at the Olympic games in either 484 or 480, and commemorates it here on his coinage. The use of the hare is almost certainly a joint reference to the abundance of the animal in the vicinity of Rhegion (according to Aristotle, Anaxilas is supposed to have also introduced it to Sicily), and to the cult of Pan that flourished among the Messenians. This hypothesis is supported by the presence of a head identified as Pan as an adjunct to the hare on later tetradrachms of Messana.