Ex Hunt, Gillet, Vlasto, and Seltman Collections

Triton XXI, Lot: 306. Estimate $7500. Sold for $32500. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

CALABRIA, Tarentum. Circa 430-425 BC. AR Nomos (20.5mm, 7.65 g, 2h). Phalanthos, nude, riding dolphin left, holding akrostolion in extended right hand, left hand placed on dolphin’s back; below, crawfish left / Taras as Oikistes, his torso bare, wearing himation from his waist, seated left on stool, holding bird by its wing with his right hand, his left arm resting on the stool back. Fischer-Bossert Group 17, 266l (V124/R199) = Hunt I 177 = Gillet 62 = Vlasto 216 = Vlasto, Taras, Type 37, b = M. P. Vlasto, “Rare or Unpublished Coins of Taras” in NC 1907, 5 (this coin); HN Italy 844; SNG BN 1688; SNG Lloyd 137; Gulbenkian 22; de Luynes 284; Jameson 101; McClean 562 (all from the same dies). EF, beautiful old cabinet toning. Superb style and exceptional for issue.

From the J. L. Gomer Collection. Ex Numismatica Ars Classica 78 (26 May 2014), lot 180; Nelson Bunker Hunt Collection (Part I, Sotheby’s New York, 21 June 1990), lot 750; Charles Gillet Collection, 62; Michel Pandely Vlasto Collection, 216; Charles Seltman Collection.

In his 1907 paper in the Numismatic Chronicle, Vlasto remarked that this piece is “[a] charming stater of exquisite workmanship, showing all the details of the types on the obverse and reverse.” In the later publication of his collection, Vlasto further described it as “F[leur] d[e] C[oin] a real gem.”