Choice New Style Tetradrachm
ATTICA, Athens. Circa 168/5-50 BC. AR Tetradrachm (30mm, 16.81 g, 12h). New style coinage. Polyxarm(o)-, Nikog(e)-, and Phanokle-, magistrates. Struck 132/1 BC. Head of Athena right, wearing triple-crested Attic helmet decorated with a palmette and griffin on the bowl /
A-QE, owl standing right, head facing, on amphora; winged caduceus to left, A on amphora,
SF below, magistrates
POLU-CARM, NIKOG, FANO-KLE; all within wreath. Thompson - (obv. die 368); CNG 42, lot 341 var. (same obv. die; month
DI). EF, even gray tone with light golden hues around the devices. Extremely rare with these three magistrates.
From the Semon Lipcer Collection.
Phanokle- was one of the last 3rd-magistrates to strike in the anchor-star series of the prior year (see Thompson 368g-h). He apparently continued into this winged caduceus series, and is known on both drachms (Thompson 373a) and tetradrachms (Thompson pp. 150-151 - unconfirmed piece cited in RN 1885, p. 15). The present piece confirms the contiguity of these two series, as not only is this magistrate present on both, but this coin was struck with Thompson’s obverse die 368, which was also used with both the anchor-star and winged caduceus series.
