Sale: CNG 82, Lot: 265. Estimate $1500.  Closing Date: Wednesday, 16 September 2009.  Sold For $2350. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

SICILY, Akragas. Circa 406 BC. AV 2 Litrai – Diobol (1.31 g, 7h). Silanos, magistrate. Eagle standing left, snake clasped in its talons, on rock outcrop; two pellets (mark of value) on rocks / Crab; below, ΣIΛA/NOΣ in two lines (the lower retrograde). SNG ANS 998-9; McClean 2039 (same dies); Pozzi 387/385 (same obv./rev. dies). VF, obverse slightly off-center. Rare.

From the J. Olphin Collection. Ex George & Robert Stevenson Collection (Classical Numismatic Group XXVI, 11 June 1993), lot 21; Numismatic Fine Arts II (25 March 1976), lot 35.

The magistrate’s name, Silanos, is found on tetradrachms (SNG ANS 1000) as well as gold diobols with marks of value. As it does so often, gold indicates anticipation of an emergency, and thus this last issue of the city can be dated to the period before its capitulation to the Carthaginians in 406 BC (see C. Boehringer, "Die Finanzpolitik und Münzprägung des Dionysios von Syrakus," Essays Thompson, pp. 15-6).