Triton XVII, Lot: 79. Estimate $5000. Sold for $8000. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

SICILY, Syracuse. Hiketas II. 287-278 BC. AV 60 Litrai – Dekadrachm (16mm, 4.28 g, 2h). Struck circa 279/8 BC. Head of Persephone left, wearing wreath of grain ears, single-pendant earring, and necklace; [ΣYPAKO]ΣIΩN to right, torch to left / Nike, holding kentron in right hand and reins in left, driving galloping biga right; fibula above, Θ below, EΠI IKETA in exergue. Buttrey, Morgantina, dies 3/– [unlisted rev. die]; BAR issue 41; HGC 2, 1277; SNG ANS 776; SNG Lloyd 1523; SNG Fitzwilliam 1361; Hunterian 185 (all from the same obv. die). Near EF, underlying luster, some die rust on obverse, double struck on reverse.

Little is known of Hiketas beyond his coinage, but Buttrey pieces together a history based on the numismatic evidence. Following Hiketas’s defeat of Phintias, tyrant of Akragas, he set out against the Carthaginians. This campaign ended in disaster at the Terias river, northwest of Syracuse. Buttrey, based on his die analysis, concludes that this gold issue was struck very hurriedly towards the end of Hiketas’s reign, and theorizes that this series was issued to pay for his Carthaginian campaign.