Sale: Triton XIII, Lot: 588. Estimate $150.  Closing Date: Monday, 4 January 2010.  Sold For $90. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

KINGS of PARTHIA. Gotarzes I. 91-87 BC. AR Drachm (3.99 g, 12h). Ekbatana mint. Diademed and draped bust left, wearing tiara with ear flap, long beard, and torque ending in pellet; all within pelleted border / IΛΣIΛEΩΣ BΛΣI ΛEΩN/ΛPΣΛKOV ΔIKAIOV EVEPETOV/KΛI ΦIIEΛΛHN (sic), archer (Arsakes I) seated right on throne, holding bow. Sellwood 29.1 (Mithradates II); Shore 102 (Mithradates II); PDC 39567 (this coin). Good VF, dark toning.

From the Todd A. Ballen Collection. Ex Dr. Robert Gonnella Collection (Peus 388, 1 November 2006), lot 366.

Soon after his final defeat of Mithradates II in 91 BC, Sinatrukes was soon supplanted in Ekbatana and Rhagae by Gotarzes I, then expelled in 88/7 BC from Susa by Mithradates III, and sought refuge among the “Guti” until about 77 BC when he made a fresh attempt at gaining the Parthian throne.

Gotarzes I, the eldest son and Satrap of Satraps of Mithradates II, was immediately procaimed king upon his father's death at the hands of Sinatrukes. He apparently spent the bulk of his reign struggling against the rebel, and successfully expelled him from Ekbatana and Rhagae. Dr. Assar has attributed to him the S32 tetradrachm, as his inaugural issue from Seleucia, and S29 drachms. However, some scarce coins, struck from far less skilful dies than those cut at Ecbatana and Rhagae, appear to imply that perhaps shortly before his death, Gotarzes succeeded in extending his power to the north-eastern Parthian frontiers, probably as far as Margiane, where he had his crude drachms minted.