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Research Coins: Electronic Auction

 
292, Lot: 44. Estimate $100.
Sold for $340. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

THESSALY, Larissa. Circa 440-400 BC. AR Trihemiobol (10mm, 1.14 g, 1h). Possible Orphanides forgery. Small, round shield with dotted border, having as a central device the head of the nymph Larissa left, her hair tied in a bun in the back / The nymph Larissa kneeling left, bouncing ball with right hand. Fine, toned, porous, cut on obverse produced by sawing effect.


From the BCD Collection.

This perplexing coin does not quite fit into the coinage of Larissa. The obverse is clearly related to the “shield with bull’s hoof” fractions, but a “shield with head of Larissa” type is otherwise unknown. The former typically carry a bust of Asklepios on the reverse, but rare “shield with bull’s hoof” trihemiobols with the nymph Larissa on the reverse are known (see previous lot).

In such cases, one must then arrive at the question of authenticity. While the metal appears ancient, the thick, compact fabric is quite different than what we find on the “shield with bull’s hoof” coinage. BCD suspects the coin of being a product of Orphanides, an extremely talented forger active from the 1930s through 1960s. The collector has long been intrigued by the work of this engraver, who, like Christodoulos, added wear to his pieces to increase their believability. The excellence of the mysterious Orphanides’ work has thus far precluded the production of a thorough corpus of his forgeries.

While we normally would not offer such a suspect coin, we have decided to in this case. While relegated to black cabinets, such forgeries (if it indeed is, which seems likely) nonetheless form an integral and illuminating part of important collections like BCD’s.