Sale: CNG 69, Lot: 931. Estimate $1000.  Closing Date: Wednesday, 8 June 2005.  Sold For $2000. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

THRACE, Bizye. Philip I. 244-249 AD. Æ 29mm (15.60 gm, 7h). Laureate, draped, and cuirassed bust left / BIZ-VHN-WN (WN ligate), Capaneus, armed, preparing to scale the walls of Thebes by ladder. Mouchmov -; SNG Copenhagen -; cf. Varbanov 1709. VF, black-green patina with traces of brick-red, minor smoothing in fields. ($1000)

From the Garth R. Drewry Collection.

Capaneus was one of the Argive commanders who joined forces with Polynices to retake the throne of Thebes from the latter's brother, Eteocles. According to the Roman poet, Statius, Capaneus was a man of immense size and strength. He was also an exemplar of great arrogance. While scaling the walls, he boasted that not even Zeus could stop him, whereupon a thunderbolt struck him down, killing him. Capaneus' wife, Evadne, distraught at her husband's death, immolated herself upon his pyre.