Second Known

Sale: CNG 78, Lot: 410. Estimate $750.  Closing Date: Wednesday, 14 May 2008.  Sold For $1550. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

KINGS of MACEDON. Alexander III ‘the Great’. 336-323 BC. AR Tetradrachm (17.10 g, 12h). Arados mint. Civic issue, dated CY 54 (206/5 BC). Head of Herakles right, wearing lion skin / Zeus Aëtophoros seated left; palm tree in left field, AP monogram below throne; [zzz]z–aaxc (date) in exergue. Price -; Duyrat 1248 var. (D25/R- [unlisted rev. die]). EF, lightly toned. Extremely rare year 54 issue.

From Collection C.P.A.

Both Price and Duyrat show a break in this Phoenician-dated series after CY 45. However, Price missed the then-unique CY 54 coin that appeared in as lot 1655 in the 1970 Superior sale (= Duyrat 1248), and has the Aradian Alexanders resuming production with the Greek-dated series in CY 58. The present coin, struck from the same obverse die as the Superior coin, is apparently the second-known for this isolated Phoenician-dated year.