Sale: CNG 67, Lot: 267. Estimate $750.  Closing Date: Wednesday, 22 September 2004.  Sold For $800. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

SICILY, Hipana. Circa 450 BC. AR Litra (0.66 gm). Eagle standing left / Dolphin left; pecten below. SNG ANS -; SNG Copenhagen -; SNG Lockett 789 = Pozzi Sale 461 (this coin); De Luynes 986. Good VF, toned. Very rare. ($750)

From the Tony Hardy Collection. Ex Moretti Collection (Numismatic Ars Classica 25, 25 June 2003), lot 78; R.C. Lockett Collection (Glendining's, 26 October 1955), lot 671; Pozzi Collection (Naville I, 14 March 1921), lot 461.

The evidence for placing this issue at Hipana is doubtful. That there are no known coins with a city ethnic for Hipana, the location of the city is not known with certainty, and no other issues are placed there, suggests that the attribution is not correct. These types are an exact match for litras of Motya during the early Punic period of that city (see Jenkins I, pl. 23, 1), but all known specimens invariably have that city's Greek ethnic. Nonetheless, there are known early Punic didrachms of Motya that lack any ethnic or control marks (e.g. Jenkins I pg. 34, 4-5), and it is therefore probable that this coin is also from this period at Motya.