Sale: Triton IX, Lot: 150. Estimate $1500.  Closing Date: Monday, 9 January 2006.  Sold For $4750. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

BOIOTIA, Haliartos. Circa 525-480 BC. AR Drachm (6.07 g). Boiotian shield, upright aspirate in each side opening / Square incuse with clockwise mill-sail pattern. Head, Boeotia p. 11; BMC 2; Imhoof-Blumer, Münzkunde, 18, pl. IX, 2; SNG Forbat 315. Good VF, dark cabinet tone. Very rare in this condition. An attractive and desirable specimen of unadorned but powerful early archaic coiner's art. ($1500)

Ex Malter XIV (8 June 1980), lot 68; A. Rhousopoulos Collection (J. Hirsch XIII, 15 May 1905), lot 1708.

The earliest silver issues of Haliartos (before the aspirate moves to the reverse) are much rarer than the corresponding issues for Thebes. Some of the fractions are either unique or known by only two or three examples, all in museums. The drachms, such as this, are notoriously difficult to find reasonably centered and in decent condition.