From my small but growing group of coins from Troas, I'm showing two that have some interesting connections to the Trojan War. First up is a scarce little piece from Ophrynion, showing a three-quarter facing bust of Hector. Hector was the eldest son of King Priam of Troy and the city's greatest champion. During the Trojan War, he defeated and killed the Greek hero Protesilaus, dueled Ajax the Great for an entire day to a stalemate, and finally, was overcome and slain by Achilles. Ophrynion is traditionally held to be the site of Hector's tomb, and accordingly its handful of issues celebrate him. As a bonus, the reverse of this one has a chubby baby Dionysos holding out a bunch of grapes. TROAS, Ophrynion Circa 350-300 BC AE12 1.9g, 12mm SNG Copenhagen 456-9; SNG von Aulock 1559; BMC p.75, 4-7. O: Bearded head of Hektor three-quarter facing right, wearing crested helmet. R: ΟΦΡ[Υ], infant Dionysos naked, kneeling right, holding out bunch of grapes in right hand. This is a coin I really wouldn't mind upgrading at some point, but probably not at the price fetched at auction by this example last September : http://www.sixbid.com/browse.html?auction=1487&category=31621&lot=1343144 It seems that these used to be quite rare, but more have been turning up and Pecunem auctioned a couple of decent ones for about $100 last year. Mine is one of those "uniformly found worn and corroded", so it's a good thing it was about a hundred times cheaper than the Roma example. While there's no doubting that piece is very nice ("for this issue" or no), I wonder how much of its GBP 1100 closing was contributed to by the nice writeup in the auction that quoted the passage from the Iliad about Hector's funeral procession.
I love this next one from Thymbra, with its Zeus-Ammon obverse and eight-rayed star reverse. It has a dark black patina and is a little rough to boot, so it's been quite a challenge to photograph. I'm resigned to it being a better-in-hand coin, but still hope to do it more justice with better photos eventually. TROAS, Thymbra Circa 4th century BC AE17 5.0g, 16.9mm SNG von Aulock 158; BMC Troas pg. 89, 4. O: Head of Zeus-Ammon left. R: ΘΥ, star of eight rays; monogram below. This coin doesn't have a Trojan hero on it, but the city of Thymbra is the stage for a dramatic side scene during the Trojan War, one concerning the Trojan prince Troilus (same Troilus in Shakespeare's Troilus and Cressida). Troilus was Hector's younger brother, and a prophecy held that Troy would not fall if Troilus was allowed to live to adulthood. Achilles therefore sought the youth out and ambushed him while he was watering his horses at a well outside Troy. Troilus fled to the sanctuary of Apollo at Thymbra, where Achilles followed him and beheaded him at the god's altar. Yup, that Achilles was one nasty piece of work... Oops, sorry, I mean to post this picture ...
those are some cool old AE's Z. the zeus coins is cool, but i'd love to have a coin with hector on it...that's pretty awesome.
Mmmmmm, Troas ... please don't get me started "again, and again and ... " => absolutely awesome Troas coins!! (man, I may spend all of 2015 concentrating on Troas domination?) Honestly dawg ... I'm lovin' your new examples ... => woof!!
Not sure if you've shown all of yours before? I really like the one you have from Pitane with the pentagram reverse.
Thanks, yeah I would love to see a heroes of the Trojan War collection. Thanks! That sounds like a plan... I think there were only about two dozen cities in Troas that minted coins. I've got a two-bodied owl I'm coinstalking .
Thanks, Eng, I'm still with the December stuff. Gonna see how long I can stay on this brand new 2015 wagon .
No, I haven't shown that one yet. I've been meaning to make a big writeup of Zeus Ammon but holiday and family things have put me behind. I was also waiting for another target coin but so far I'm being blown out of the water in the current auctions.
Man, have I had that feeling before... if only all ancients were available on demand, so to speak. Coins from Thymbra are rare enough that they don't even have their own Wildwinds page yet. I only see one example of my coin currently being sold on Vcoins. I wasn't specially looking out for this type, but when I saw it come up I knew I had to have it.
