Sale: CNG 67, Lot: 397. Estimate $15000.  Closing Date: Wednesday, 22 September 2004.  Sold For $22000. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

SICILY, Siculo-Punic. Circa 264-260 BC. AR 5 Shekels - Dekadrachm (37.54 gm). Time of the First Punic War. Head of Tanit left, wearing single pendant earring and wreath of grain ears / Pegasos flying right. Jenkins IV, Series 6, 440 (O2"/R9); SNG Copenhagen 180 (same obverse die); DeLuynes 3758 (same dies). Good VF/EF. Very rare. ($15,000)

From the Garth R. Drewry Collection. Ex Harlan J. Berk Buy-or-Bid Sale 113 (3 April 2000), lot 115.

Although her relations with Carthage had been largely amicable since the late sixth century BC, Rome’s growing influence in Magna Graecia in the early decades of the 3rd century BC led inevitably to an increasing rivalry between the two western Mediterranean powers. One major reason was that Rome was now being drawn into the long-standing, bitter dispute between the Greeks and Carthaginians in Sicily and, more often than not, was siding with the former. This magnificent medallic piece was issued at about the time of the outbreak of the First Punic War which, after almost a quarter of a century of fighting, brought a cessation to Carthaginian influence in Sicily. Find-spots for these coins have been exclusively Sicilian. Although horses had always been popular on Carthaginian and Siculo-Punic issues, the depiction of the winged Pegasos represented a departure from tradition. The influence of the Corinthian coinage and that of her colony Syracuse seems obvious. The typically enigmatic Punic inscription translates “in the land”, and the Carthaginian stronghold of Panormos on the north coast of western Sicily has been proposed as the possible mint for this impressive issue.