Featured Lokris Opuntii Stater

I acquired this coin a few months ago but haven't posted it yet. I've always admired the staters from Lokris but hadn't found one which "spoke" to me like this one. My pictures capture the details but fail to show how lustrous the surfaces are. One of these days, I'm hoping 3D photography will be more readily available to truly share what coins look like in-hand.



Lokris, Lokri Opuntii. Silver Stater (12.0 g), ca. 350-340 BC. Head of Demeter right, wearing wreath of grain ears, single-pendant earring and necklace. Reverse: Ajax advancing right, holding sword and shield; on inside of shield, palmette and griffin springing right; on ground below, broken spear. BCD Lokris-Phokis 457.4 (this coin); Nanteuil 885 (same obv. die). Lustrous and well struck in high relief. Well detailed, Superb Extremely Fine, and among the finest known. Ex BCD Collection (NAC, 8 October 2010), 457.4.

Here's a historical writeup of the type, pieced together from a number of different historical sources and auction descriptions:

Opus was the main city of eastern Lokris, which was located to the north of Boeotia stretching to the coast opposite Euboea; it was separated by Phokis and Doris from western Lokris, which was on the northern coast of the Gulf of Corinth. It was a small, infertile territory, surrounded by larger, more powerful states. The Lokrians made but a small impact in history, and why the somewhat obscure town of Opus in Lokris should have produced such a lovely and extensive coinage is uncertain: military expenses seem the most likely reason.

Seltman suggests that mercenaries returning home after the Peace of Antalkidas in 387 B.C. brought considerable amounts of silver with them. These coins, with Syracusian designs, represented their salary, thus providing the bullion and models for the coinage of their home city. It is likely that Lokris may have needed this new coinage to pay for its continual conflict with neighboring Phokis during the Third Sacred War.

There are some varying opinions on who is depicted on the obverse of these coins, ranging from Persephone, to Demeter, to Arethusa. It is clear, however, that the inspiration was the Syracusian Arethusa heads of Euainetos. The general consensus for this particular variety is that the head is of Demeter, the mother of Persephone.

The staters of Lokris are divided into two basic groups by the way that their reverse legends are executed: the earlier type has the legend divided on each side of the reverse, and the later without spacing.

The reverse depicts the hero “Ajax the Lesser”, son of Oileus, commander of the Lokrians in the Trojan War. The shield Ajax carries is particularly remarkable for having its decoration on the inside: there are some sculptural parallels for this but it is a very uncommon attribute.

The Lokrian Ajax plays an essential role in the Iliad. He often fought side by side with his namesake, Ajax the Great, son of Telamon and led a strong contingent of forty ships to Troy. He is described as small, nimble, and a great javelin thrower and was counted among the heroes of the Greeks. However, he was considered arrogant and conceited and because of this, he died by the wrath of the gods.

After the capturing of Troy, Cassandra, the prophetic daughter of the king of Troy, fled to the temple of Athena and embraced the statue of the goddess, pleading to her. Ajax the Lesser found her and, violating one of the core principals of ancient religion, dragged her from the temple, toppling the statue in the process. As punishment, during their return, Athena sent a major storm on the fleet of the Greeks, scattering the ships. Athena sank the ship of Ajax himself with a thunderbolt but he nevertheless was saved by managing to cling to a rock. He boasted that he had braved the wrath of the gods, but Poseidon, upon hearing this blatant display of hubris, split the rock with his trident, causing Ajax to drown. The rest of the Opuntians reached home with difficulty but safely.

Nevertheless, the faith of the Lokrians was so great in their national hero that whenever their army prepared for battle, one place was always left open for Ajax, whose spirit they believed would stand and fight with them. And, in remembrance, they annually honored their former leader by launching a ship fitted with black sails and laden with gifts, which they then set alight.

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If anyone else has an example of the type, or other coins from Lokris, share them here!

 

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An excellent coin as usual with a very interesting write-up. Greek coins happen to be my weak subject at the moment in ancient coins, so I learned quite a bit.

Ajax is still remembered to this very day in the form of household cleaners. lol



I don't have any coins of Lokris, let alone any Greek coins. But I have noticed that some from this region are within my budget range.

Congrats on the new coin!

 

He is indeed They recently started running a slightly different slogan on their bottles:



"Ajax: Stronger than grease" - which is a fantastic pun for history buffs, and is easily enough to convince me to change cleaning products.

 

These Lokri Opuntii staters are so distinctive they always seem to just jump out of the auction catalogs. Your new pickup is absolutely beautiful!

 

Dang...if I didn't know better I'd say they modelled his abs after mine...

But of course that couldn't be, mine are way better.

 

gorgeous grade you have there. I do not collect ancients. this coin must have costed a small fortune. ???

 

That's great! Wouldn't have understood the pun without your writeup.

Fabulous coin!

 

That is a great coin with very strong detail inside the shield. I always liked this issue because of the idea of decorating the back side of the shield.

Mine is a 1/4 stater or hemidrachm depending on who you ask and I prefer to catalog it as a coin of Opus city rather than under the regional name but I know nothing of the political situation that caused some coins to be inscribed in this way. The smaller version has a snake inside the shield and this one has a minor type under Ajax that I will call a jellyfish (take that you animal collectors!). Need I mention that mine is not the finest known?

There are coins inscribed LOKRWN which I would be more inclined to attribute to the regional name and many other minor types (none I have seen beats my jellyfish, IMHO, but I'm prejudiced). The head is quite high relief making a weak strike likely to lose details on the body of Ajax. That full strike is what makes the OP coin so special.

As AJ mentioned, it seems likely that the silver for my little coin came home from the wars with soldiers. I like to think mine was made by melting down dekadrachms and restriking the silver in more practical denominations.

 

Wow AncientJoe, that's an unbelievably wicked looking coin (congrats!!)

=> your coin is also amazingly cool, Doug (and yes, a "jellyfish" is definitely a fantastic-score in the ol' animal-coin catalogue!)

 

WOW! I love both of these coins. AJ, that may be one of your best that you've shown here (I don't know that since they are all amazing). But dog-gone-it, now I have another coin to add to my wish list. A Stevie little brother, my birthday is in September............

 

That is an amazing coin AJ! Absolutely stunning!
This type has been on my hit list, but I have not found the right one for my budget.

 

Beautiful coin and nice write-up. Thank you.

I will now add my usual irrelevancy. Even the Batavians still remember Ajax's greatness (in the emblem of their soccer team):

 

Let us all remember the famous Ajax was a different guy. The coin here is Ajax Minor. Cleaning products manufacturers and soccer teams probably don't care but we should.

 

Uh oh, Doug's wearing his Pedantic Pants again

(Mine are at the cleaners.)

 

Focus Pants on people!

 

No pants!!? => wooohoooo!! ..... yessss (wow, it's Friday again?)

 

No pants? Wow!

 

Happy Birthday, V

 

Thank you much, I'm wearing my focus pants now.

Random bit of information, I just had callbacks for a show I'm trying to get a part in, fun, fun, fun. Soooooooo anyway, you people probably won't be seeing as much of me for a while, as I've decided to take a sabbatical from CT. I made my decision based on the fact that I "might" need to spend more time on my schoolwork, and it's kind of hard to do so with all you bundles of joy around.

I'm thinking that when school is over in June I'll have more time, so starting Monday...

I'm gonna miss you guys.

 

Stop by when you come up for air.