Refined Style

Sale: Triton XI, Lot: 261. Estimate $5000.  Closing Date: Monday, 7 January 2008.  Sold For $18000. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

CARIA, Achaemenid Period. Circa 350-334 BC. AR Tetradrachm (14.21 g, 6h). Struck circa 350-341 BC. Persian king or hero in kneeling-running stance right, drawing bow / Persian satrap on horseback right, thrusting spear held in his right hand, left hand on rein. Konuk, Influences, Group 2; SNG Copenhagen (Persian Empire) 290-291 var. (symbol on rev.); Traité II 128; Babelon, Perses 623 var. (symbols on obv.); Pixodarus 1-11. Good VF, toned, a few traces of porosity. Both dies engraved in the finest style for the type, displaying unusual detail in the facial features and musculature.

The archer-horseman tetradrachms are one of the most enigmatic Persian coinages struck in Asia Minor prior to the invasion of Alexander the Great. Though various symbols and letters occur in the fields, no inscription exists to help us identify the issuer, mint, or purpose of issue. Konuk, however, identified two series, with and without subsidiary symbols on the reverse. Also, analysis of the Pixodarus Hoard has allowed the coinage to be dated from the decade beginning circa 350 BC. Additionally, as only the earlier, non-symbol, type is represented, Meadows concluded that the date of deposit of the Pixodarus hoard, 341 BC, served as a tentative divider between the two series.