Hi ancient coins talkers, Have searched the web for hours and days trying to find were this AR coin is from: Diameter 11 x 12 mm, weight 2.18 g. I am hoping you can help me with the identification. Guess it is a triobol or hemidrachm. Thanks for any information, link or reference you can give, Chris
Neat coin! Carry it with you so you'll have it anytime you need to resolve an important decision with a coin toss. Tip: always use this coin, and always choose "heads" in the coin toss, and I have a feeling things will go your way. Sorry - I didn't have anything intelligent to add, so that's all I have.
Yeah, on second thought, don't go flipping it around. Good luck on the ID. Someone with a bit more helpful information should be along eventually. Maybe @dougsmit or one of the other ancient experts...
The only thing I'm an expert at is procrastination. Reminds me of Mytilene with Apollo. Closest I found was this electrum. PRO: LESBOS PO : MYTILENE PZ : Between -478 and -455 Obverse VT : HEAD MAN L / APOLLO VA : WREATH LAUREL Reverse RT : HEAD WOMAN R RA : SPHENDONE Technical details M : EL GEW: 2.43(1) ZIT: BODENSTEDT S219 32,1(1) / SLG BOSTON I 1690(1)
Thank you so much ancientone, that would be something if mine were EL, but no it is silver. Can't find the exact reference you sent, but I will keep searching. Using your info I found a similar one at wildwinds, ancient coinage of Lesbos, Mytilene, BMC 12 but Apollo is looking r.: Hemidrachm, Lesbos, Mytilene, 400-350 BC, 1.22g. BM-12. Obv: Head of Apollo r. Rx: Female head r. (Aphrodite?) wearing earring; hair rolled. Took another picture, hoping that maybe this one is better? Here you can see the earring on the female head, but it seems that Apollo has one also?
its' a neat little coin. i'm not familiar with these types, but it looks Greek to me( no pun intended)
Thank you all! I kept searching and found a similar one at https://www.acsearch.info/search.html?id=463662 Mine has an inscription to the outer left of Apollos head, I can't read it but I will try to make a better picture. Definitely it has no inscription behind Aphrodite's neck.
used a magnifying glass and behind Aphrodite's head there probably is ΛΠA- it is very difficult to see, and behind Artemis (not Apollo) there is an N also very hard to see...
So... according to the attribution on that ACSearch entry, this might be from Salamis in Cyprus, then? Interesting. I browsed that Wildwinds page with thumbnails, but didn't see a match.
Yes, lordmarcovan, exactly. There was no similar or matching entry in wildwinds, nor in vcoin. I don't know why some coins are not there. You can also see it here: http://www.asiaminorcoins.com/gallery/displayimage.php?pid=3988
Thank you very much John. Ancient Greek and Roman (Augustus and other emperors) and some Medieval. I have to say that rather than collecting I am trying to organize the collection of my late father. He was a passionate collector throughout his lifetime. Never found any index made by him, so I am trying to identify each one. By now I have identified 91 coins, and I still have a long way to go.... At first I thought I would not be able to do it, and even offered the collection to the local museum; two specialist saw it, but never got back in touch, so I guess it is of little or no numismatic interest for a museum. Chris
Your coin is quite rare and valuable. Coins of the original kings of Cyprus before the Hellenistic age are all rare and valuable. The example you showed on AsiaMinorCoins has an estimate of 1200 euro. Here are links to the British Museum collection, published in 1904: https://books.google.com/books?id=Wxo-AQAAMAAJ&pg=PA63#v=onepage&q&f=false The British museum had five specimens. Many other coins in that catalog cannot be seen online because no specimens have sold in the last 20 years.
Unless you toss it into an envelope, then put my address and some stamps on that, and then toss it into a mailbox.
