Ainianes

Triton XV, Lot: 26. Estimate $300. Sold for $3750. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

Ainianes (IACP, pp. 683-684)

The Ainianes were the inhabitants of the district of Ainis, an area to the south of Thessaly (albeit considered part of it), which bordered on Malis and Oita to the east, Aitolia on the south, and Dolopia and Achaia Phthiotis on the north. Its major city was Hypata (IACP 420), which was where coinage in the name of the Ainianes, the people of Ainis, was struck. There are some archaeological remains there, but none of particular importance. Hypata had been in the Aitolian League since 302 BC and suffered damage from the Romans in 191 BC; it had left the League by 168 BC and was joined to Thessaly by Augustus in 27 BC. It was prosperous in Roman times and was the seat of a Christian bishopric. Later it became known as Neai Patrai and was an important medieval city; it is now the modern town of Ypati. As noted, the coinage in the name of the Ainianes was struck at Hypata; as were a very small amount of bronze coins in the name of Hypata itself destined for narrowly local circulation, and now extremely rare. The main body of the coinage of the Ainianes was struck around the middle of the 4th century; then comes a small group struck during the time of Demetrios Poliorketes, and an even smaller group of coins that utilized the types of the Aitolian League: their dating is highly uncertain. Finally, there is a somewhat astonishing group of coins, both silver and bronze, that simply must date to the 1st century BC, probably starting no earlier than the 80s and ending no later than the 30s BC.

THESSALY, Ainianes. Hypata. Mid 4th century BC. AR Hemidrachm (15mm, 2.80 g, 6h). Laureate and bearded head of Zeus to l. / ΑΙΝΙΑΝΩΝ, the hero Phemios, naked but for a belt holding a short sword in a scabbard, chlamys draped over his shoulders and his left arm, standing l., facing front with his head turned to r., hurling a javelin with his r. hand and holding his petasos with his l. as if it were a small shield; on the ground line between his feet, the letter Φ sideways. SNG München 1. Warren pl. XVI, 680 (same obv. die). Good VF, nice surfaces but toned somewhat unevenly.