ELIS, Olympia. 78th-80th Olympiad. 468-460 BC. AR Stater (20.5mm, 11.63 g, 6h). Fine.

CNG Feature Auction 133
Lot: 232. Estimated: $ 750

Greek, Coin-in-Hand Video, Silver

Sold For $ 1 000. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

Go to Live

ELIS, Olympia. 78th-80th Olympiad. 468-460 BC. AR Stater (20.5mm, 11.63 g, 6h). Eagle flying left, holding serpent in talons / Thunderbolt with wings above, volutes below, within incuse circle. Seltman, Temple 10 (dies H/κ); BCD Olympia 6; HGC 5, 288; Pozzi 1815 (same dies). Old cabinet tone, bankers’ marks, test cut on reverse. Fine. Very rare.

From the Santa Monica Collection, #53. Ex Berk BBS 93 (14 November 1996), lot 187; Giessener Münzhandlung 78 (13 June 1996), lot 155.

Located on the northwest corner of the Peloponnesos, the sacred shrine of Olympia became established as the site of the most important Greek festival of athletics in the eighth century BC. The first Olympic Games were held in 776 BC, consisting solely of a foot race, or stadion, won in that year by Koroibus of Elis. As time went on, more events were added, including wrestling, boxing, long jump, javelin, discus, and chariot races. The contests became so important that Greek cities at war would declare a temporary truce to allow athletes to cross their lines. Soon a permanent complex was built to house the games, and a magnificent temple of Zeus containing a statue ranked as one of the Seven Wonders of the World was completed in 463 BC. The first coins of Olympia date to the games of 468 BC, and new types were issued at four year intervals (to coincide with the games) thereafter. Three basic types were struck, depicting a head of Zeus, Hera, or an eagle. The finest die engravers were employed in their production and coins of Olympia rank as some of the greatest masterpieces of Greek coinage.

The final winners of all CNG Feature Auction 133 lots will be determined at the live online sale that will be held on 15-16 September 2026.

CNG Feature Auction 133 – Session One – Lot 1-308 will be held Tuesday morning, 15 September 2026 beginning at 9:00 AM ET.

Winning bids are subject to a 22.5% buyer's fee for bids placed on this website and 25% for all others.

We recognize that our users may have various Internet Browsers and Operating Systems. We like our visitors to have the best possible experience when using our bidding platform. However, we do recognize that it is impossible to develop applications that work identically, efficiently and effectively on all web browsers. The CNG bidding platform supports the latest stable major version and stable previous version of Chrome and Firefox.