Sale: Triton VIII, Lot: 484. Estimate $1000.  Closing Date: Monday, 10 January 2005.  Sold For $900. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

LYCIA, Oinoanda. After 188 BC. AR Didrachm (8.24 gm, 12h). Dated year 2 (187/6 BC?). Laureate head of Zeus right; lotus-tipped sceptre over shoulder, B (year) behind / OINOAN/[DEwN] below in two lines, eagle standing right on winged thunderbolt, wings closed, sceptre (or sword) behind round shield in right field. Cf. BMC Lycia pg. 73, 1. Near EF, weakly struck in the center. ($1000)

This coin is the only piece in the present group to be struck from the early obverse die with a small head of Zeus.

THE COINAGE OF OINOANDA

Oinoanda, located in the upper valley of the Xanthus River, was a substantial city in antiquity but issued its own silver coins only at one moment in its long history. Until recently, this coinage was known from just a single example acquired in 1897 by the British Museum. The appearance of a small group now enables us to study the coinage in more detail.

Richard Ashton is presently preparing a study of the coinage of Oinoanda and has tentatively dated these silver coins to the years following the peace of Apameia (188 BC), which followed the Roman defeat of Antiochos III at Magnesia in 190 BC. Under the terms of the peace, much of the formerly Seleukid territory in Anatolia passed to the control of Pergamon and Rhodes. In these circumstances, Oinoanda was apparently able to establish a degree of autonomy sufficient to permit its own coinage. The known coins are dated Year 1, 2, or 3 (the coins below are all Year 2 or Year 3), and we have suggested tentative dates below on the assumption that the era is dated from the peace of Apameia. The coins vary considerably in weight but appear to be based on the Attic didrachm. Richard Ashton has suggested that this unusual denomination may have been designed to exchange easily both with Attic weight coinage and with the new cistophori of the Attalids who took over the region in 188 BC, three Oinoanda didrachms being exchangeable for two cistophoric tetradrachms. The purpose of the coinage remains uncertain but may have been connected with the costs of the Hellenistic city walls which were probably built in this period. All of the following coins will be cited in Richard Ashton’s forthcoming publication.

We would like to thank Richard Ashton for his generous assistance in the preparation of this note.