Greek Silver & Bronze

Lot 3206    Session 11 (9.30am Thursday)    Greek Silver & Bronze

Estimate $150
Bid at live.noble.com.au
SOLD $150

ATTICA, Aegina, (510-500 B.C.), silver stater, (11.690 grams), obv. smoothed shell sea turtle without row of dots down dorsal spine, countermarked with bird in flight, rev. 'Rough incuse developed early Union Jack pattern', (S.1849 [£350], Asyut Group IIa-b 'thin collar type', cf.425-437, BMC 3 [p.11]). Fine/very fine, worn obverse die.

The Asyut hoard suggests the chronology to be 510-480 B.C. Much has been written on this early coinage since Samuel Millbank published 'The Coinage of Aegina' in 1924. Since then various numismatic scholars endeavoured to establish the order of issue and the chronolgy of this series, usually by employing data from a relevant hoard. They include W.L. Brown 'Pheidons Alleged Aeginetan Coinage' (NC 1950, pp.177-204); R. Ross Holloway, 'An Archaic Hoard From Crete and the Early Aeginetan Coinage' in ANS Museum Notes 17 (1971, pp.1-21, (based on his doctoral dissertation [The Elder Turtles of Aegina, 1960, Princeton University]); Price and Waggoner, 'Archaic Greek Silver Coinage, The 'Asyut' Hoard', pp.69-76; Carmen Arnold-Biucchi et al., 'A Greek Archaic Silver Hoard from Selinus' ANS Museum Notes pp.14-22. The chronology is still under review and new hoards when published will all contribute to finally resolving the matter. Eg. Colin Kraay in ACGC (p.43-4) places the small skew reverse coinage (Asyut Group VII) to around 500 B.C. in contrast to Asyut dating of 490-475 B.C. Reference can be made also to SNG Delepierre as that publication illustrates 298 staters from Aegina, (known as the Megalopolis Hoard), and in the Paris cabinet since 1966. It was buried about 431 B.C.