Aegina Sea Turtle Stater Post Em

I found this guy on my desk today. Not the prettiest girl at the dance... but she's real. Weighs in at 12.2 Grams. Post yours!

 

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You have the rare south end of a northbound turtle variety. You have three of the six important appendages but most people prefer the other three.

I'll show three.

An earlier stater with claws on the feet and head turned so you can see the bill. I love these early, baroque shaped ones.


This stater has little going for it but a major die cud below the turtle. I bought it from CNG in 1998 when they considered it too junky to put in a sale but I like die breaks this big. It is also clawed and may be a die duplicate of this one:
http://www.acsearch.info/search.html?id=1657671


Last is my little obol. I know everyone likes staters better but the high relief of this little guy appealed to me so he followed me home.


I regret being a cheapskate back in the late 80's when I almost bought a stater that I considered overpriced at $40. It was oval about four times as long as it was wide and had the head and just a bit of one foot on the flan (almost no body). The seller thought he had priced it down enough to allow for the lack of centering but I wanted more for less so did not get it. Since then I have seen many worse turtles but never one that far off center. I thought it showed the first sea creature first crawling onto dry land. I wonder how has it now.

 

Here's my Aegina stater, although it's a land tortoise - still searching for a matching sea turtle:

 

Nice ...

Ummm, just because I'm a glutton for punishment, I'll follow AncientJoe's gorgeous tortoise with my humble, worn-down smooth-shelled sea turtle, with single row of dots down the middle (not visible on this specimen) ...

=> that's okay lil' Yertle ... they're not laughing at you, they're laughing "with" you ... *awkward*

 

But, Steve, you have at least part of all six appendages. I suspect AJ will have trouble finding a Sea Turtle as nice as his Land Tortoise but if anyone can, he is the man for the job.

 

Cool find! Don't have one myself.

 

OMG that grade is amazing and probably a small fortune. thanks for posting it.

 

Observation: High end dealers that regularly sell owls of Athens in EF seem to have trouble finding high grade sea turtles. Many are graded VF but have enough wear that VG seems closer. There are a few with intact or bold dots on the shell (not all had them in the beginning) but most look like they really circulated. AJ's land tortoise is better than the vast majority of these but it even has a little wear. We see more higher grade land types than sea but neither seems available in what one might call mint state. Condition centered collectors should plan on a long and expensive search.

 

I may as well show mine:

 

Has anyone ever figured out why this proud naval power switched from depicting sea turtles to land tortoises halfway through production?

 

They were defeated and no longer were a naval power.

 

Yeah, but why advertise that? I mean, would we change our coinage from an eagle to a chicken if we lost a war? Usually they were more braggards on their coinage than that, weren't they?

 

What if the terms of the peace included the switch to chicken as a punishment for being defeated? I doubt all those factories making trinkets printed "Made in Occupied Japan" on every plate because the liked having the US there.

 

also on my list...

but nice turtles everyone!

I LIKE TURTLES!

 

I agree that it does have a bit of wear but the consensus I've received is that the highest points on my coin are weakly struck, not worn. It doesn't make much aesthetic difference but is a fair assessment in my eyes because of the relief of the coin. I passed on a few examples with better shell detail around the same time as they weren't nearly as high relief or as broad-flanned as this one (an attribute I personally quite like).

 

Dude, it's gorgeous. Especially the hints of toning.

It's even better than mine. Now I'm jealous ;3

 

Could one of you explain the reverse? Was there any rhyme or reason to the pattern, was it multiple strikes or one... I've seen this on many coins, and though the pattern is similar in nature, it is always a bit different.

 

The striated coins were most likely mde the way they were to prevent forgery. I mean, it would be pretty difficult to make a counterfeit the same way.

It wqs probably for this reason, and for aesthetic qulity as well. From memory, I think the earlier ones were much more simple like the quadripartite incuse squares. The later issues were more complicated and even had insignia on them.

I'm not sure how they went about retiring old currency, if they even did. Looking at the countermarks they couldn't have gotten it all, anyway.

Again, that's my best guess. Maybe someone knows the real answer?

 

This is an old thread but you all are turtle experts. Can anyone make out what this countermark on a smoothshell is? Is there a graphic list of ancient countermarks for these issues available?

 

I thought it was so they could "see inside" the coin to be sure that it was precious metal all the way through. Is that right? Or is my memory playing tricks on me?