Sale: Triton VIII, Lot: 62. Estimate $7500.  Closing Date: Monday, 10 January 2005.  Sold For $7750. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

SICILY, Katane. Circa 464-450 BC. AR Tetradrachm (17.17 gm, 8h). River-god Amenanos as a man-headed bull kneeling right; above, Nike flying right; in exergue, ketos right / NOIHATAK(sic), Nike running left, wearing long chiton, holding a fillet in her right hand. Randazzo 62 (this coin); SNG ANS -; SNG Copenhagen -; SNG Lloyd 887 var. (Nike holds two fillets; same obverse die); Rizzo pl. 9, 13 (same reverse die); De Luynes 888 (same reverse die). Superb EF, reverse double struck. Magnificent obverse. Very rare. ($7500)

Ex Randazzo Hoard, 62.

The Sicilian city of Katana (modern Catania) was a Chalkidian colony founded from Naxos in 729 BC. It was located midway along the eastern coast of the island at the southern extremity of the slopes of Mount Aetna. Its fertile territory was coveted by neighboring Syracuse and in 476 BC the Syracusan tyrant Hieron I removed the population of Katana to the inland city of Leontini. Katana was now given the name of Aetna and re-peopled with Syracusan citizens and a group of Dorian mercenaries. On the fall of the Sicilian tyrannies in the late 460s, the alien population was expelled and the former inhabitants of Katana returned from exile in Leontini to reclaim their city, which now reverted to its original name. It seems unlikely that any coinage was produced at Katana prior to the events of 476 BC, so any issues bearing the name of the Katanians must postdate the restoration of the original population in 461 BC. This handsome tetradrachm from the 1980 Randazzo hoard marks the beginning of this coinage and depicts on the obverse the local river god Amenanos in the guise of a man-headed bull. The spirited figure of Nike holding a diadem appears, like so many Sicilian coin types, to have an agonistic significance.