CNG 99, Lot: 373. Estimate $1500. Sold for $900. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

ARABIA, Eastern. Uncertain. 1st century BC(?). BI Tetradrachm (20.5mm, 14.86 g). Imitating the reverse type of Alexander III of Macedon. Smooth convex surface / Shams, wearing tainia and chlamys, seated left on backless throne, holding eagle in his extended right hand, leaning with his left on a long staff; palm frond (or tree?)and d (in South Arabian) in left field, z’m (in South Arabian) to right. Unpublished. VF, toned. Apparently unique.

This hitherto unknown type provides another example of how incomplete our picture of the numismatics of this area is. Both the seated Shams type and the weight securely place this coin in the area of the Persian/Arabian Gulf. While inscriptions in monumental South Arabian (Musnad) script do occasionally appear on earlier coins from this region (cf. the coinage in the name of Abyatha, or the series with Shams written in full), these seem to have been completely replaced by legends in various forms of Aramaic (as on the Abi'el series) as of the 2nd century BC. This unique coin with its enigmatic legend (perhaps a name?) thus comes as a complete surprise.