Sale: Triton V, Lot: 1228. Estimate $7500.  Closing Date: Wednesday, 16 January 2002.  Sold For $7000. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

SICILY, Syracuse. Circa 405-400 BC. Reverse die signed by Euainetos. AR Dekadrachm (41.99 gm). Charioteer driving galloping quadriga left, holding kentron in right hand, reins in left; Nike flying above and crowning charioteer; below heavy exergual line: a military harness, shield, greaves, cuirass and Attic helmet all connected by a horizontal spear, [AQLA] below / SU-[RA-K-O-SIW] above, wreathed head of Persephone-Kore left, wearing triple-pendant earring and necklace, surrounded by four dolphins swimming; signed [EY-AINE] below lower dolphin. Gallatin obv. R. III/rev. C. IV; SNG ANS 363-364 (same obverse die); Dewing 879-881 (same dies). Toned VF, smoothing on obverse, light marks on reverse. ($7500)

This enormously influential nymph's head, conceived and developed by Euainetos, was copied prodigiously in the fourth century, especially on the Agathoklean and Siculo-Punic coinages. This issue is perhaps associated with the politics of Dionysius I at the time of his first Carthaginian War, 406-404, or the second war initiated in 397 and ultimately successfully concluded in 392/390, leaving Dionysius master of the island 'archon of Sicily'.