First Coinage of Babylon – Last Achaemenid Issue?

CNG 106, Lot: 516. Estimate $2500. Sold for $3250. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

PERSIA, Achaemenid Empire. temp. Darios III. Circa 333-331 BC. AV Double Daric (20mm, 16.53 g). Mint in Babylonia. Persian king or hero, wearing kidaris and kandys, quiver over shoulder, in kneeling-running stance right, holding dagger in right hand, bow in left / Patterned incuse punch. Carradice Type IV Late (pl. XV, 54); Meadows, Administration –; BMC Arabia pl. XX, 1; Sunrise 38. Near VF, off center, area of flat strike, minor die break on obverse. Extremely rare issue without control marks, only the BM and Sunrise pieces published.

Carradice lists this issue among all the late double darics that he attributes as Alexandrine issues. Nicolet-Pierre, in her article on the Alexandrine gold and silver at Babylon, though, does not mention any Type IV Late double darics, only pieces similar to Type III, where the king/hero holds a spear, and all include control marks. This coin, like the Sunrise and BMC examples, shows no sign of control marks that are present on the Alexandrine coinage, and the style is closer to the standard darics of this type that Carradice gives to the time of Artaxerxes II to Darios III. Thus, it is possible that this was a very late, if not the last, Achaemenid issue, just prior to the defeat of Darios III. It probably was struck at the same Babylonian mint that later issued the double darics under Alexander, and may have been set up to provide coinage to the Persian king in Babylonia, as his western mints were no longer under his control. Regardless of whether this issue was made under Darios or Alexander, it is doubtless from the first coinage struck in Babylon.