Pedigreed Euth- & Eumenes Signed Tetradrachm

CNG 90, Lot: 365. Estimate $75000. Sold for $70000. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

SICILY, Syracuse. Second Democracy. 466-405 BC. AR Tetradrachm (26mm, 17.28 g, 9h). Dies signed by Euth- and Eumenes. Struck circa 413-405 BC. Nike as charioteer, holding reins in both hands, driving fast quadriga right; above, Nike flying left, crowning charioteer with wreath; in exergue, Skylla, holding trident, swimming right; behind her, dolphin swimming right; EVΘ before / Head of Arethusa left, wearing wreath of grain ears, and necklace with lion head ornament; EVM below neck; four dolphins and [ΣV]PAKO-ΣIΩИ around. Tudeer 46 (V15/R28); SNG ANS 273; Rizzo pl. XLIII, 11; Basel 460; BMC 153; Gulbenkian 279; Jameson 796; McClean 2714; Hunterian 45 (all from the same dies). EF, attractively toned. A Classical Greek masterwork.

Ex Triton XIII (5 January 2010), lot 59; G. Hirsch 166 (16 May 1990), lot 91.

By the middle of the 5th century BC, the situation in Sicily prefigured much later developments in Renaissance Italy, when local princes engaged in continual warfare among themselves, while employing the services of the finest contemporary artists and craftsmen. Wars required significant amounts of coinage to hire mercenaries, and the increasing cultural sophistication of the courts encouraged artistic experimentation – the result was the patronizing of some of the most talented coin engravers in history. In Syracuse and surrounding cities, the anonymous "Demareteion Master" and the "Maestro della foglia" were followed by their students and successors - Choirion, Euainetos, Eumenos, Exakestidas, Herakleidas - all of whom proudly signed their works. These masters developed new ways of viewing the world through art, breaking the static forms developed in Archaic and early Classical art, thereby developing new methods of portraying motion and life in miniature. The silver tetradrachm was the preferred denomination for such expression, providing a sufficient canvas upon which these artists had free-range to create. At Syracuse, these artists infused the standard typology - the victorious charioteer and the head of Arethusa - with a vigorous lifelike quality that places these coins among the finest works of numismatic art. The chariot scene was transformed from a two-dimensional view to a dynamic three-dimensional perspective, with the horses arrayed in such a manner as to give the viewer the impression that the horses are emerging from the field. On the reverse, the previously stoic and sedate profile of Arethusa was now imbued with a certain individuality. Although her adornments varied in the way her hair was kept and the kind of earrings she wore, the vitality of her countenance now offered a radiant immortality.