Sale: CNG 69, Lot: 396. Estimate $750.  Closing Date: Wednesday, 8 June 2005.  Sold For $2000. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

IONIA, Ephesos. C. Atinius C.f., Praetor. 122-121 BC. AR Cistophoric Tetradrachm (12.55 gm, 12h). Dated CY 13 (122/1 BC). Cista mystica within ivy wreath / Bow case between two serpents; IG and caduceus above, torch to left. Stumpf 1; Kleiner, Ephesus 19; SNG Copenhagen -; Dewing 2275 (same obv. die). Near VF. Extremely rare, fewer than ten known. ($750)

The earliest Roman cistophoric tetradrachm. T.R.S. Broughton, in The Magistrates of the Roman Republic 3. Supplement (1986), identified this praetor as C. Atinius Labeo, who is best known for attempting to have the censor (and hero of the Fourth Macedonian War) Q. Caecilius Metellus Macedonicus thrown off the Tarpeian Rock for expelling him from the Senate (see Livy, Per. LIX.10).