Triton XV, Lot: 101. Estimate $200. Sold for $3750. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

THESSALY, Kierion. Second half of the 4th century BC. Æ Trichalkon (20mm, 8.26 g, 6h). Laureate head of Apollo r. / ΚΙΕΡΙΕ[ΙΩΝ] l. up, Zeus, naked, striding r., hurling thunderbolt from his r. hand and with eagle perched on his outstretched left; in field r., Arne half-kneeling to her l., looking back and playing with knucklebones to her r. Rogers 178, fig. 75; Maurice Lafaille, Choix de Monnaies Grecques en Bronze, 1982, 114 (this coin); Pierre Strauss, Collection Maurice Lafaille, 1990, 327 (this coin). Good VF, medium to light green patina, a very attractive coin. From the collection of Maurice Lafaille.

Ex Münzen und Medaillen 76 (19 September 1991) 327, hammer CHF 850.

From the same master engraver who sculpted the obverse die of lot 477 (Metropolis) below. Maurice Lafaille was not only a charming gentleman with “old world” culture in the real sense of the words, but also a man of exquisite taste, possessing an infallible eye for Greek and Roman bronze coins. His Sestertius collection was auctioned by Vinchon in Monte Carlo on 23 April 1976 and, in spite of the fact that the two and a half colour plates of enlargements are sometimes too dark, one cannot but be impressed by the impeccable taste of the man. His preface to that catalogue “comes straight from the heart” as we would say today and should be read by all collectors of bronze coins. This writer unfortunately never had the opportunity to meet M. Lafaille in person but has a nice handwritten letter thanking him for the gift of a bronze coin (no. 285 in the Strauss book).