Two Signed Tetradrachms of the Second Democracy

Sale: Triton XI, Lot: 59. Estimate $5000.  Closing Date: Monday, 7 January 2008.  Sold For $7250. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

SICILY, Syracuse. Second Democracy. 466-405 BC. AR Tetradrachm (17.15 g, 9h). Dies signed by Eumenes and Eukleidas. Struck circa 415-405 BC. Charioteer driving fast quadriga left, holding kentron in right hand, reins in left; above, Nike flying right, crowning charioteer with laurel wreath; EVMHNOV in exergue / SURAKOSION, head of Arethusa left, wearing circular earring and necklace; EUKL/EIDA inscribed on tablet below chin; four dolphins around. Tudeer 24 (dies 9/16); SNG ANS 259; SNG Lloyd 1368; BMC 193; de Luynes 1207 (all from the same dies). Good VF, lightly toned. Both signatures fully visible.

From Collection C.G. Ex William N. Rudman Collection (Triton V, 15 January 2002), lot 1221; New York Sale II (2 December 1999), lot 26.

In the last two decades of the 5th century BC Syracuse was the focus of an unparalleled experiment in Greek numismatics. Its economy was fueled by the vast amount of currency required to pay the mercenaries by which the city's hegemony expanded, and the high denomination silver coins struck at this time became canvases for the most brilliant engravers of antiquity. The artists who engraved these tetradrachms, Eumenes, Sosion, Euainetos, Euthymos, Phrygillos, and Kimon, were held in high regard in their own day, and allowed to place their names prominently on their dies.