I wouldn't even know where to start. South American?? If I just had an idea, I'd happily search away.
India, western satraps, 3rd century ad. Silver. Interesting coins, imitative of indo-greek coins. They go for around $20 or so in that condition.
I have about 8 of them at home. Not my primary area I try to concentrate on, but close enough that I have a few different types. This type is about in the middle, not the earliest copies with better style, but neither the late issues with very poor style. My guess is around 250-275ad they were minted.
As I recall the satrap's name is at the top with his father's name at the bottom so these with part legend may be hard to ID fully. The reverse scene is a mountain with a three part scalloped line underneath and sun made of dots above and to the right so both of these will have to be IDed based on the father's name. I only have 4 of them and one I still can't ID. There is a year date behind the head on the obverse and the one on the right shows a bit of those letters so someone who knows the series could possibly get that one. Most are just sold as 'Western Satraps'. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_Satraps
This site will probably have good info. http://coinindia.com/ Look under Galleries and Western Kshatrapas.
Coin India is a great site with many coins much better than what you are likely to see which can be good for confirming an ID but I still have Satraps coins I can't ID for sure. I suspect a few years practice with reading the script would help but most coins are part legend and that make it hard on a beginner like me. I note that Frank Robinson is offering these coins for $9.75 selected for portraits which means the names and dates will probably be partial. The question is whether we want pretty coins that are only partly identifiable or identifiable coins that are only a little pretty? Getting both takes searching.
To be fair, Frank has the lowest prices I have ever seen for these coins. I have a few of his, and they are ok, but all I have are not identifiable.
That is rather the point. You can get coins with the ID legend clear and the face off the flan or a decent face and the legend scanty. Both at the same time costs about 3 times as much. Frank's ad makes it clear he was selling portraits for people who don't care which king it was. I suspect that those will be easier to sell than ones that clearly name the kink and show no facial details. They must have been hammering these out a mile a minute to get all the poor strikes we see.
The problem I have is demonstrated by the coins below. Are they the same ruler or just relatives? Who? Date? There is enough script that both should be identifiable but for me it is a struggle at best.
I tried looking at a generic Western kshatrapa page on coin india and this seems to be the best fit to your images. http://coinindia.com/galleries-rudrasena1.html Both coins look almost identical to me, suggesting the same ruler, maybe different mints or different years. Also, don't know how helpful this is, but I figured out that the script on the page at coin india begins at the first letter clockwise to the crescent above the three hills in the center on the coin images you posted. So the "J" at 1 o'clock seems to be the starting position of the script image on the king's page. Reading clockwise from there matches fully with the script on the page for Rudrasena 1. The last five letters say the king's name.
Thanks. I had come to Rudrasena for the right coin but had the left one as Rudrasima (his father). My confidence in this is well under 50%. I understand there are two mints involved but have not gone that far. What I see here is a situation like late Roman collectors face separating coins of Constantine I and II and Constantius II where a single letter makes a lot of difference. Here, however, we have a language I don't read in a script that varies a bit from coin to coin and is off the flan on more coins than not. It will take more study than I have so far been willing to undertake.
I am not clear on why so many of my posts hang up but appear twice when I close the browser and go back in. As a non-moderator, I do not have the right to delete a post (correct?) so all I can do is edit it as done here???
