Sale: Triton IX, Lot: 1146. Estimate $10000.  Closing Date: Monday, 9 January 2006.  Sold For $11000. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

[Ancient] INDIA, Kushans. Huvishka I. Circa 152-192 AD. AV Quarter Dinar (1.98 g, 12h). Mint I (A). PAONANOPAO O-OHPKI KOPANO, crowned and diademed bust left on clouds, flame on right shoulder, holding mace sceptre and sword hilt / CARAPO, Serapis, nimbate, seated facing, holding diadem in right hand and sceptre in left; tamgha to left. MK 164 (same dies); J. Rosenfield, The Dynastic Art of the Kushans, p. 98 and pl. IX, 186; Donum Burns -; MACW -. EF. Extremely rare. ($10,000)

This is the fourth known example of this coin type, and the first to appear at auction. There were none in the Skanda and Hirayama collections.

The figure of Serapis demonstrates most clearly the multi-cultural proclivities of the Kushans. A specifically Hellenistic combination of the important and highly popular Egyptian gods Osiris and Apis, representing the religious syncretism of the Greco-Roman gods with their foreign counterparts in the period following the death of Alexander the Great. As the supreme god of the Alexandrian pantheon, the god had a large temple-complex in that capital, known as the Serapeum. Although quite popular in the Roman Empire, the apparent rarity of this reverse type suggests that this god failed to achieve a similar level of popularity among the Kushans.