Browsing eBay and found this coin that took me a while to figure out what was on the obverse (bottom photo). It's a Seleucid coin with Apollo holding a bow on the reverse (top photo). I attached a poll to see what every one thinks it is.
I went with a horse, though it was a complete guess. The later Seleucid coinage is an area im not vey familiar with, despite collecting coins of Seleukos I Nikator and his immediate successors. After putting together his great collection, i have complete faith in @Deacon Ray to get this one. I know Antioch issued serrated bronze coins for around 40 years. What was the other mint?
Head right; wearing wreath or with fancy hair; something over shoulder. I suspect Artemis. Dotted border. Very off center to the lower right side. A quick search didn't turn up any Seleukid serrates with Artemis/Apollo. Maybe I'm wrong, or maybe it's rare, or maybe it's an aberration. Reverse has a clear Delta so start digging through old reference books to see if one of the three Seleukid kings named Demetrios issued this coin. A crude attempt at outlining what I described:
I'm with @TIF —in her opinion that it's a section of a profile of one of the Seleucid rulers. I have a similar type below.
Thanks to the 9 10 people that voted. The answer is JK The obverse of the coin depicts Artemis with bow and quiver over shoulder. Due to the wear and central dimple, it gives the illusion of depicting an animal which fooled many including me at first. I'll use TIF's and Doug's images to illustrate. Between her crown looking like ears and rolled hair looking like a muzzle, what really made the effect was the dimple (from plan prep) gave the illusion of an eye. Seems time and burial made for a neat trick on this coin which was minted under Demetrios I. Congratulations to @TIF for being the first to answer correctly. I can offer as a prize um.... this virtual cow (that some thought was on the coin ) to be offered to the gods. Thanks for playing!
Very interesting. I rechecked the search I ran and found something I can't explain. Before posting my mockup I ran an ACsearch search with the words "seleukid AE serrate artemis apollo" and got nothing. I thought perhaps the "AE" was causing a problem but it is not. I'm able to use that term in other search strings. I did the following test and cannot explain the results: "seleukid AE serrate artemis apollo" = no results found "AE serrate artemis apollo" = no results found "seleukid serrate artemis apollo" = 4 results found, including the OP type) "serrate artemis apollo" = 7 hits (three of the OP coin and four unrelated) "AE serrate artemis" = 4 hits (all one type of Seleukid but not the OP type; why not?) "AE serrate apollo" = 6 hits (none of the OP type; why not?) Can any of you explain this to me? I made the switch to ACsearch slowly over the last few months. Prior to that, when searching for comparisons or identifcations my first stop was always CNG archives and I was accustomed to their wonderful search engine. This test of ACsearch makes me wonder if my search results have been accurate. Apparently not! Edited to add: The ligate Æ vs. non ligated AE might be the explanation. Annnnd edited again: Yep, that was it. If the listing has a ligated AE and I type the separate letters, it doesn't match and the results won't show. Wow, I'm sure thankful for this thread because otherwise I might not have noticed this! I'll search more carefully now.
I was just figuring that out and editing my post as you were posting this and I feel rather stupid for not realize the problem earlier
We coin collector types suffer from a fact of search engine life. We become accustomed to the best of the search software routines like Google that read our minds and return results on what we would have typed if we were not fumble fingered or slow in the head. Most of our coin dealers and groups like acsearch require us to type closer to what the person that entered the record typed. That means Seleucid and Seleukid don't always play well together. Some programs are much worse than others. Try CNG Research on the name Vabalathus and again on Vaballathus. You will find one coin that is returned on both since the entry was made with two ll's the first time and just one l lower down in the text. I love the CNG database. I do not love the hardliner programmer that wrote their search routine. Who here wonders what Google gives you if you insist on searching Vhaballathus? https://www.google.com/search?q=vha...x9ncAhUliOAKHbEeC7AQvgUIJygB&biw=1600&bih=735 This will get worse as we key in older records that are more likely to enter Cyzicus than Kyzikos or a thousand other Greek/Roman variations. We need a search engine that returns hit for 'woman with helmet' showing coins with either Athena or Minerva. We do not need software that makes us 'feel rather stupid'. I can do that quite on my own, thank you very much!
For those who aren't that familiar with acsearch yet, entering "(AE Æ)" will act like the boolean "AE OR Æ". Acsearch has a number of equivalencies in their thesaurus, but I always enter alternate spellings between parentheses just to be sure. Another useful tip: use "-commentaires" to eliminate a whole bunch of spurious CGB results, which is sometimes a problem.
In my experience I have found it is best to keep the search to as few words as possible. Yes, it returns often too many results, but one can look at said results and add a word or two that pop up in common to narrow it down. But my primary annoyance and as Doug pointed out is the spellings. "K" and "C" are often used interchangeably and without regard to any logic. Too many revisionists out there, and it drives me nuts. But, thats also the reason why some will note coins I have listed that in the heading use one spelling and a different one in the description itself. That way a lot might show up if one uses either spelling.
Interesting post and coin. I struggle with the letters used on struck RR coins. My computer version of Word does not have the older forms of A, L & P. If I want Æ instead of AE I cut and paste. The following is from Grueber. There are plenty of combined letters on RR coins like the AX on this bronze -
