Sale: Triton IX, Lot: 316. Estimate $500.  Closing Date: Monday, 9 January 2006.  Sold For $1300. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

BOIOTIA, Tanagra. Lot of two Æ. (a) Antoninus Pius. 138-161 AD. Æ 26mm (13.57 g, 11h). Laureate head right; CAIANTwN - EINOCEYCEBHC clockwise from the left around / Young Dionysos standing left, holding kantharos and thyrsos, under roof supported by two Atlantes on pillars; below, Triton swimming to left looking back; TANA-GRAI-wN circular clockwise from the left. Imhoof-Blumer, Boeotiens, 111 (with line drawing); NCP p. 114, 3 pl. X, VII (same rev. die) // (b) Marcus Aurelius. 161-180 AD. Æ 27 (12.43 g, 12h). Laureate head right; EYCEBHC - AYT - KAIANTwNEINOC anticlockwise from top left around / Same as last. Cf. SNG Cop. 240 (same obv. die); cf. Imhoof-Blumer, Boeotiens, 111 (for reverse type; with line drawing); cf. NCP p. 114, 3 (for rev. type). Coins Near Fine and Near VF, respectively, both extremely rare, (a) is probably the second known of that type for Antoninus Pius. Two (2) coins in lot. ($500)

(a) Ex Heller Collection, with the collector's ticket [acquired from Seaby's, 1968].

Apparently one of the chief attractions for the tourists of those days visiting Tanagra was a Triton preserved by pickling; the specimen was so famous that it decorates the exergue of all their Antonine issues having as a reverse type this shrine of Dionysos.