Tetradrachms of Lysimachos

Sale: CNG 82, Lot: 340. Estimate $500.  Closing Date: Wednesday, 16 September 2009.  Sold For $400. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

KINGS of THRACE. Lysimachos. 305-281 BC. AR Tetradrachm (16.98 g, 3h). Lysimacheia mint. Struck 297/6-282/1 BC. Diademed head of the deified Alexander right, with horn of Ammon / Athena Nikephoros seated left, left arm resting on shield, spear behind; monograms to outer and inner left. Thompson -; Müller -; SNG Berry 403 (same obv. die). Good VF, struck with worn obverse die, die shift on reverse.

At the beginning of his reign, Lysimachos continued to use Alexander’s coinage types, later modifying them by replacing Alexander’s name with his own. In 297 BC, Lysimachos introduced a new type: the obverse was a portrait of Alexander; the reverse was Athena, Lysimachos’ patron goddess. G.K Jenkins noted the power of the Alexander portrait in his commentary on the Gulbenkian Collection: “The idealized portrait of Alexander introduced on the coinage of Lysimachos in 297 BC is characterized by the horn of Ammon which appears above the ear. The allusion is to Alexander’s famous visit to the oracle of Ammon at the Siwa Oasis in 331, when the god is supposed to have greeted Alexander as ‘My son’.... [T]he best of the Alexander heads on Lysimachos’ coinage...have a power and brilliance of effect that is irresistible. It [is speculated] that these Alexander heads may have derived from an original gem carved by Pyrgoteles, an engraver prominent among the artists of Alexander’s court....” Regardless of the inspiration for the new design, part of the remarkable attraction of this coinage is its artistic variety: each engraver created his own fresh and distinctive portrayal of the world’s greatest conqueror. See CNG 81 for the background on the kingdom of Lysimachos as reflected in his network of mints.

Edward T. Newell’s study of Lysimachos’ lifetime issues arranged them according to the territorial expansion of his kingdom. Unfortunately, Newell died before completing his study, and consequently many issues are missing from Margaret Thompson’s survey of his unfinished work. The many ‘unpublished’ coins that have appeared over the past two decades reveal how little is known about Lysimachos’ coinage. Although most catalogs list these unpublished coins as posthumous issues, this is unlikely, as most of his mint cities were taken over by other kingdoms following Lysimachos’ death. Nevertheless, Lysimachos type coinage was so popular, and became so commonly accepted, that some cities in the region of Lysimachos’ empire continued to produce coinage in the Thracian king’s name long after his death. These posthumous coins, struck over some 200 years, are not issues of Lysimachos, but rather the civic coinage of individual cities or the imperial coinage of later kings, such as Mithradates VI of Pontos who issued an extensive gold and silver coinage in Lysimachos’ name. Accordingly, beginning with this catalog, CNG will list the posthumous Lysimachi under their respective cities or other issuing authorities; only the lifetime issues will be listed under Lysimachos. The one exception will be posthumous issues from uncertain mints, which will continue to be listed under Lysimachos.