Artistic Weary Herakles

CNG 99, Lot: 323. Estimate $2000. Sold for $2500. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

SELEUKID KINGS of SYRIA. Antiochos I Soter. 281-261 BC. AR Tetradrachm (30mm, 16.62 g, 12h). Magnesia ad Sipylum mint. Diademed head right / Herakles seated left on rock, lion's skin draped over rock, holding club set on ground; two monograms in exergue. SC 318c; WSM 1456 (same obv. die as illustration); HGC 9, 129. Good VF, lightly toned, light surface roughness. Struck from dies of high artistic merit.

Ex Gorny & Mosch 169 (13 October 2008), lot 137; Classical Numismatic Group 72 (14 June 2006), lot 936; Lanz 125 (28 November 2005), lot 448.

In WSM, Newell notes (p. 273) that the engraver of this splendid obverse die, known to Newell from just a single example, was surely the same artist who engraved a small number of superb portraits at Smyrna (WSM 1493-4). Newell further points out that this is one of the earliest issues of the weary Herakles type, which was introduced toward the close of Antiochos I’s reign. The significance of the design is uncertain but may reflect the personal situation of the aging Antiochos, resting like Herakles after many labors.