Lately I've been interested in Corinthian staters. Just love the design. Been reading a little about them trying to understand what's going on. It seems that they were minted in a range that was from about 350 BC to 4 BC? Then the Romans took over not long after. Did they really produce them for hundreds of years using the same design or was there long breaks? Ive learned that there are hundreds of different types with the Pegasus and Athena design with varying details signifying where they're from. I realize the Koppa symbol means it was minted in Corinth and that's what I want, but many other city states produced them as well. All the types are interesting but does anybody know what's rarer than something else? How do they pinpoint a time period? How do they know one was from 4 BC as opposed to 330 BC? And the big question, where do they come up with valuations? It's obvious that eye appeal, strike and centering plays a role and the best ones are much more expensive. But I mean, are there a million of them out there? 100k, 1k? Does anyone know? They're cool but you would think they'd be obscure enough to not be a $1200 coin and I'm wondering if they're really that rare or the nicer pieces are just rarer? Or maybe they're not rare at all. Are some more desirable than others? .
@Vess1 I agree. Pegasi are exceptional coins. They were produced as trade coins in large numbers for centuries by Corinth, her colonies and cities in Italy and Sicily. Here is a good short summary about them with an emphasis on Magna Graecia by David Vagi in Coin World: https://www.coinworld.com/news/world-coins/the-pegasi-of-italy-and-sicily.html The definitive reference is Calciati's Pegasi in 2 volumes published in 1990, but it is not online and is expensive. In general, Pegasi are fairly common but very popular so nice examples can be expensive. The coins of certain cities can be more rare than those from other mints. Dates are usually determined by studies of the various mints and rulers. To get an idea of various issues, a search on acsearch for "Athena Pegasus stater" gets over 10,000 results but you can pick various cities or symbols to narrow the source. Here is one of the first coins I bought when I started collecting ancients several decades ago: Corinth AR Stater 375-300 BC 8.5 g O: Pegasus flying left; koppa below R: head Athena wearing Corinthian helmet left; thyrsus to right Calciati 418 Here is one of my favorites because of the nice style: Syracuse, Agathokles AR stater 307-289 BC 6.7 g O: head Athena wearing Corinthian helmet right R: Pegasus flying left; triskeles below Calciati 19 Look at as many examples as you can to get some idea of the different types and styles along with the price range.
