Sale: Triton VIII, Lot: 1597. Estimate $1000.  Closing Date: Monday, 10 January 2005.  Sold For $1000. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

GERMANY, Saxony. Johann Georg II.1656-1680. AR Klippe Taler (22.92 gm, 12h). Shooting Festival in Dresden. Dated 1678. (orb) IOH GEORG II D G DUX SAX IUL CLIV & MONT ELECT, crowned coat-of-arms within Order of the Garter; four smaller coats-of-arms around / MDC LXXVIII EINWEYH D NEUEN SCHIES HAUSES, Hercules standing facing, clad in lionskin and resting on club, holding apples of the Hesperides; 1 THAL in lion mask below. Davenport 7636; KM 562. Good VF, old collection toning. Interesting mythological type. ($1000)

The golden apples of the Hesperides, which Eurytheus had ordered Hercules to fetch for him, were guarded by the immortal, unsleeping dragon Ladon. Hercules killed Ladon with arrows dipped in the blood of the Hydra, and then, having been warned by Prometheus not to touch the apples himself, convinced Atlas to collect them for him, while he held up the Earth in his place. Hercules' marksmanship (and cunning?) earned him a place as patron of the Dresden Shooting Festival.