Hi. This ancient oval coin measures only 8 millimeters at width and 10 mm. at length. It looks silver, may be Phoenician or Greek. Could you please assist me to identify this coin? Thanks. Charles
Phoenicia, Sidon AR 1/16 Shekel (obol). 4th cent BC. Obverse: War galley above double line of waves; above, Phoenician letter. Reverse: Persian king right holding lion, preparing to slay him; O between; all within incuse.
The coin weighs 0.77 g. The letter between the king and the lion is likely to be a Phoenician R , and may possibly not be an O . What significance could it bear? Charles
Mine came with the note that the letters between the man and lion were Phoenician sideways for 27. Most of these seem to have an have a O. Mine also translated the letters above the galley as year 21. I do not know how accurate these are. I bought mine because the letters seemed clear compared to most but I never followed through with reading them myself.
Thanks for fun and research. I think we need to know if the Persian king on the obverse is Darius or other? Then , is this coin considered as Persian or typically Phoenician. Charles
The answer to your question would be found in https://www.forumancientcoins.com/numiswiki/view.asp?key=Elayi and Elayi Sidon I have noted several different named kings of Sidon credited with these coins but all were subject to the great king of the Persians to some degree. Sidon rebelled against Artaxerxes III and probably issued coins during that period so I suspect the lion might be the city and the king the Persian (or is it the other way around?). Alexander may have ended the local coinage since we start seeing his types from that mint. I do not know details but would suggest starting with the Elayi book (published in 2004 but I don't know where you'll find one).
http://ansmagazine.com/Spring06/Sidon The above review of Elayi discusses the reviewer's disagreement with the Elayi opinion on the ID of the figure on the coins so even buying the book will not get you a solid answer but just an opinion that may or may not be valid.
Hello again. The letter O is a well known Phoenician consonant. It does not exist in Latin or Greek but only as a vowel. Only people of Semitic languages such as Hebrew and Arabic can pronounce it. The main point now is that both kings Abd Astart and Azar, in addition to Goddess Astarte all start their names with this letter O ( Ayn ) as they name it in the Phoenician language. Could that be a possible clue? Charles
