Sale: Triton IX, Lot: 973. Estimate $5000.  Closing Date: Monday, 9 January 2006.  Sold For $3000. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

CILICIA, Kelenderis. Circa 450 BC. AR Stater (10.59 g, 10h). Nude youth, holding whip, dismounting from rearing horse right / KEL, forepart of goat left within circular incuse. SNG Levante 17 (same dies); SNG France 43 var. = SNG Levante 16 var. (legend); cf. ACGC 1008. Good VF, even gray tone, typical light porosity, small scuff on obverse. The fourth and finest known of the first coin type of Kelenderis. ($5000)

At the beginning of the fifth century two equestrian races were added to the Olympic programme, one for mule-carts in 500, and in 496 an event illustrated on the above coin which remains mysterious. Pausanias, our sole authority, calls it Kalpé (5, 9.1-2). Kalpé is usually translated ‘trotting race’ in which riders in the last lap jumped off their horses and finished running alongside their mounts holding them by their bridles.