CNG 97, Lot: 92. Estimate $4000. Sold for $6000. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

KINGS of MACEDON. temp. Alexander III – Kassander. Circa 325-310 BC. AV Stater (18mm, 8.60 g, 4h). In the name and types of Philip II. Uncertain mint in Macedon. Head of Apollo right, wearing laurel wreath; pellet behind neck / ΦIΛIΠΠOY, charioteer, holding kentron in extended right hand, reins in left, driving galloping biga right; thunderbolt below. Le Rider 628 (D260/R245); SNG ANS 205 (same obv. die). EF. Attractive style. Rare.

From the Patrick H.C. Tan Collection. Ex Gemini VII (9 January 2011), lot 250; Classical Numismatic Group 69 (8 June 2005), lot 146.

Le Rider’s attribution of his Group IIIC gold to Pella was tentative. He noted that the overall style was unlike other Pella issues, and the lack of these staters in hoards of other Pella issues was troubling. These gold issues find parallels in the tetradrachm coinage of Alexander that Price assigned to Pella, but he did not provide any analysis to support their attribution to that mint. As noted by N.J. Moore (The Lifetime and Early Posthumous Coinage of Alexander the Great from Pella [Princeton University, 1984], Appendix I), Newell placed these coins at an “uncertain mint in Macedon.” Moore’s analysis of the hoards of the parallel Alexanders is most persuasive in discounting both Pella and Amphipolis as a possible mint. Noting the overall “Macedonian” style of many of these coins, she preferred a return to Newell’s original attribution.