CNG 108, Lot: 149. Estimate $500. Sold for $475. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

SIKYONIA, Sikyon. Circa 225-215 BC. AR Tetradrachm (29.5mm, 16.87 g, 11h). In the name and types of Alexander III of Macedon. Head of Herakles right, wearing lion skin / Zeus Aëtophoros seated left; in left field, youth standing left, holding tainia overhead, and dove standing left, pecking at leg of Zeus; monogram below throne. Noe, Sicyon – (A90/P– [unlisted with this monogram]); Price 720; HGC 5, 254. Near EF, lightly toned, some die wear, slight die shift and faint die break on reverse. Extremely rare, none in Pella, no others in CoinArchives, only one example noted by Price in a 1973 Kress sale (struck from the same dies as the present coin).

From the Colin E. Pitchfork Collection. Ex Gorny & Mosch 118 (14 October 2002), lot 1265.

According to A. Milavic (“Pankration and Greek Coins,” The Celator 13.12 [December 1999], and “Pankration and Greek Coins,” The International Journal of the History of Sport 18.2 [2001], pp. 179–92), the youth on the reverse is most likely Sostratos, the famous pankratiast of Sikyon who won three Olympic victories, in 364, 360, and 356 BC, as well as 12 other victories in the Isthmian and Nemean Games. Sostratos was known as the 'fingerman' for bending and breaking the fingers of his opponents in this brutal athletic contest.