Sale: Nomos 7, Lot: 36. Estimate CHF2750.  Closing Date: Tuesday, 14 May 2013.  Sold For CHF2200. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

THRACO-MACEDONIAN TRIBES, Uncertain. Circa 480 BC. Diobol (Silver, 1.02 g). Bust of Dionysos facing, with long hair falling down behind his ears, a short pointed beard, a full mustache and with drapery or a torc around the neckline. Rev. Quadripartite incuse square diagonally divided. For a tetrobol of the same type: AMNG III/2 p. 138, 26 and pl. XXVI, 5 = HPM p. 68, 2 and pl. VI, 6 = Traité I, 1821 and pl. LVIII, 10. Extremely rare, if not unique. Apparently unpublished as a diobol. With a powerful and finely made archaic facing portrait of Dionysos. Rough surfaces, otherwise, about extremely fine.

From the Spina Collection, ex LHS 102, 29 April 2008, 118.

The head on the obverse of this coin is quite astoundingly well made. Its archaic character is reminiscent of the monumental frontality found on the famous kouroi of the 6th and early 5th centuries BC.