Very Rare Portrait Stater of Artabazos

Triton XVIII, Lot: 583. Estimate $40000. Sold for $37500. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

MYSIA, Lampsakos. Artabazos. Satrap of Daskylion, circa 356 BC. AV Stater (16mm, 8.44 g, 4h). Head left, wearing a Persian tiara tied with a diadem / Forepart of Pegasos right within shallow incuse square. Baldwin, Lampsakos 21 (unlisted dies); Troxell, Orontes, pp. 35-37 and pl. 4, B; SNG France 1159–60; SNG von Aulock 7395 = Kraay & Hirmer 735; Boston MFA 1593; Gulbenkian 689; Jameson 1443a; Traité pl. CLXXII, 7 = Hunterian p. 271, 2. Good VF. Very rare.

Ex Numismatica Genevensis SA V (2 December 2008), lot 109.

Traditionally, these staters have been assigned to the satrap Orontes. Although Orontes did control portions of Mysia, he was in fact subordinate to his kinsman Artabazos who was the true satrap of the entire region of Daskylion, which encompassed Lampsakos at the time this coin was struck. When both Orontes and Artabazos rebelled against the Persian king Artaxerxes III in 357 BC, Artabazos secured Lampsakos through the agency of the hired Athenian mercenary, Chares. When Chares accomplished his mission, Artabazos richly rewarded him in coin, the likely occasion for striking this issue.