Unpublished fracional of Araxa??

Any luck yet? The lion head looks a lot like one on a Litra from Bruttium, but I saw no fish reverses from this area. I did see several bronze Hercules wearing lion skin / Tunny fish on the normal search sites, but again none like yours.

 

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No luck yet Gene, but I've emailed the pic out to a few bigger dealers to see if they recognize it.

 

I cannot read Lycian or Punic. The alphabet reminds me of this coin depicting a fish from Gades. That coin's obverse shows Herakles/Melkart *wearing* a lion skin, rather than the lion skin itself.

 

I can see the similarities between Punic and Lycian, which makes sense as they both ultimately derive from Phoenician. But the letters on my coin are definitely Lycian, see here. ARA, but upside-down relative to the fish, which is curious.

 

ARA is an acronymn for the American Restaurant Association. Perhaps the fish is going to be served up as a dish! Yum!

 

You are right John! I gave up too quickly. There is another example of this coin in the British Museum. http://www.britishmuseum.org/resear...object_details.aspx?objectId=1277057&partId=1

Are you the same John Anthony who wrote _Collecting Greek Coins_?

 

Damn, nice sleuthing Ed! No, I am not that John Anthony - we just happen to share two names. Anthony is actually my middle name.

So BMC has ARLTHI as the legend. What does it mean? My coin clearly reads ARA. The third letter is definitely not L, which is identical in Lycian to the Greek lambda, Λ.

 

The BMC coin "has" the inscription A[RLTHI], which means it has the inscription A and someone guessed the rest might be RLTHI. If you look at the list of Lycian dynasts two candidates are Harpagus=Arppakhu and Artembares=Arttum̃para. I am not sure how the Lycians abbreviated their names or did suffixes.

 

You've given me a lot to work with. Thanks VERY much for your help!

 

There is one more thing to do. The type of fish needs to be determined. I am not a fish guy but those fins look distinctive. It looks like a real species of fish, not a mythological fish. Find a web site for amateur ichthyologists (or Turkish fishermen) and ask for an ID.

 

Wow JA => I'm absolutely lovin' that wee lil' coin (obverse & reverse are both very sweet)

Ummm, but is it recently chipped/broken, or is that old damage? (just curious)

... very cool addition

Oh, and I would also like to thank Gandalf's Amazonian women for stopping by

 

Great job @Ed Snible !!!

 

Hi John
It's a very nice looking coin.

Here is one described as AR found on ACsearch. Even has a similar chip.




https://www.acsearch.info/search.html?id=1165526

Translation:
DYNASTES OF LYCIA, uncertain dynasty, AR hemiobolus, 4th c. Av. Unpublished. Right: Muzzle of face lion. Reverse: Fish on the left. Below, the letters APA. The whole in a pearl circle inscribed in a circular hollow. 0.21g. Chipped. Black patina. ...

 

I am pretty sure the Elsen coin is the same specimen as John's coin, sold via eBay.uk August 28th 2016 [ http://picclick.co.uk/LYCIA-DYNASTS-HEMIOBOL-Obv-MUZZLE-OF-LION-311681820977.html ].

 

Yes, that's my coin, thank you @doucet ! The only reason I didn't find it was because I was too lazy to do my searches in French as well as English.