New coin but it is a bit of compromise...

Discussion in 'Ancient Coins' started by Only a Poor Old Man, Jun 4, 2020.

  1. Only a Poor Old Man

    Only a Poor Old Man Well-Known Member

    One of the coins that really attracted my attention when I started collecting was the little drachms from Moesia Inferior with the Dioskouroi brothers on the observe. I thought the design was very interesting and beautiful with the 2 heads one the same side, one of them upside down. Problem is that while these coins look magnificent if in E.F condition and well struck, the attractiveness of the design will suffer if otherwise. I have been waiting for a while for a really nice one, but nothing is coming up nowdays for the right price, so I decided to settle for this one with the mind to upgrade later on if a really good example of this type hits the market. They are not expensive coins anyway and a really good one will be worth paying a little extra.

    istroscombo.jpg

    These pics don't do it justice and the coin looks better in hand, however I am still a bit iffy about it as maybe I should have waited for the right one! Nevertheless, I will keep it, but at the same time will keep an eye out for the perfect specimen of this type!

    Show me your Moesia coins! I recall I saw a couple examples in the coin storage thread :happy:
     
    Last edited: Jun 4, 2020
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  3. Bing

    Bing Illegitimi non carborundum Supporter

    I love these little coins.
    THRACE, ISTROS.jpg
    THRACE, ISTROS
    AR Drachm
    OBVERSE: Facing male heads, the left inverted (Polydeuces Castor and Pollucs (AKA Dioskuri)
    REVERSE: Sea-eagle left, grasping dolphin with talons; ISTRIH above, Q between wing and tail, K beneath dolphin
    Struck at Istros, 400-300BC
    5.3g, 19mm
    AMNG 434
     
  4. Agricantus

    Agricantus Allium aflatunense

    @Only a Poor Old Man that is a pretty well centered strike. Looks like a nice coin (can't the faces and especially the eyes very clearly)

    Istros drachmae beg for duplicates in a collection! Here is one of the two I have. Also a compromise since the reverse is off center

    2A7DD689-69D9-47D7-B627-16C03F35258E.jpeg
    CNG photo.
     
  5. medoraman

    medoraman Supporter! Supporter

    Nice coin OP. "Perfect" specimens can get more expensive than you think. I have seen FDC issues of them, perfectly centered, and pretty spendy. Seems lots of people want perfect examples of this coin.

    I love they come in different denominations. I have one about 8mm.
     
  6. svessien

    svessien Senior Member

    Istros didrachm.jpg

    These used to be quite easy to come by some years ago. This was an ebay purchase back in 2007. It was so cheap that I’ve always been a little bit suspicios, but I don’t have any reason to believe it’s fake.
    You’re going through the classics in Greek coins, @Only a Poor Old Man ! What’s next? Apollonia Pontica drachm with Gorgon? A Seleukid king? Shekel of Tyre? :)
     
    Last edited: Jun 4, 2020
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  7. medoraman

    medoraman Supporter! Supporter

    Yes they were. I bought group lots of them 15 years ago. Huge hoard found. Someone had a guesstimate I read somewhere in the tens of thousands of them in one find.

    Happens frequently in ancient collecting. Same is happening right now with Athenian owls. Before that there was a massive hoard of Hormizd II found over a decade ago, but the Sassanid market is thinner than greek and has taken this long to absorb them all.

    I always tell everyone to buy into the hoard. When hoards hit the market, prices drop. However, once the hoard is dispersed the prices go right back to where they were. ALWAYS buy when you see a hoard or you will regret it is my opinion. I think I own maybe 60-80 of these in various denominations and conditions, many of them from group purchases of collectors buying in this period.

    Yours is a very nice example sir.
     
  8. Only a Poor Old Man

    Only a Poor Old Man Well-Known Member

    This is a great coin you have there. The obverse is really nice which I think is the side that makes this coin really attractive and popular, so a slightly off-center reverse is not much of an issue. If I upgrade mine I will focus on a really good obverse and won't mind if the reverse has minor flaws.

    You are one of the people I had in mind as I spotted your coin when you were showing your Quadrum slabs. I think I also spotted one in @DonnaML 's trays. Yeap, I am trying to focus on classic Greek coins, that's definitely true... Unfortunately it is not an original thought and many people share the same goal, thus turning the coins I like into wallet-killers. :dead:
     
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  9. svessien

    svessien Senior Member

    Thank you, @medoraman :)
    I totally agree about buying when the hoard is there.
    Reminds me I should look for an Athenian owl...
     
  10. maridvnvm

    maridvnvm Well-Known Member

    Istros, Silver stater

    Obv:- Facing male heads, left inverted
    Rev:- ΙΣΤΡΙΗ, sea-eagle grasping a dolphin with talons, A below dolphin
    Minted in Istros, 400 - 350 B.C.
    Reference:– AMNG I 416, SNG Cop 192 var (right head inverted), SGCV I 1669

    [​IMG]
     
  11. medoraman

    medoraman Supporter! Supporter

    Getting towards the end of the hoard it appears, but today's $500 owl will be $1000 owl in a few years IMHO. I owned a couple before, and bought a few lately, but not my specialty area. Now, come out with a hoard of early Sassanian coins, and I am opening up my wallet, (and possibly savings account, etc). :)
     
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  12. Alegandron

    Alegandron "ΤΩΙ ΚΡΑΤΙΣΤΩΙ..." ΜΕΓΑΣ ΑΛΕΞΑΝΔΡΟΣ, June 323 BCE

    My only Moesia

    [​IMG]
    RI Hostilian 251 CE AE 27 Viminacium Moesia Bull-Lion

    Oops, I have one from this period...

    [​IMG]
    Moesia Istros AR Drachm 19mm 5.9g 4th C BCE Facing male hds inverted - Sea Eagle dolphin K Rausch 19 17
     
  13. Only a Poor Old Man

    Only a Poor Old Man Well-Known Member

    This is a stunner! I didn't know these come in staters! I have been searching for drachms so far, maybe a nice stater will eventually be my upgrade. It is interesting that in all the examples in this thread apart from mine, the head on the left is the one upside down. The nice thing about these coins is that you can choose which head you like the most to display looking up.

    Here is some improved pics of mine:

    istroscombo.jpg

    There is some green stuff on the eagle on the reverse but it is not coming off with a toothpick, so no idea what it is.
     
  14. dougsmit

    dougsmit Member

    Only a Poor Old Man showed an example of the less usual obverse with the left hand face inverted. Below is one with the eagle facing right. Most you see will be like the first coins shown but there are variations on these if you care to specialize.
    g30820bb1775.jpg
     
  15. Only a Poor Old Man

    Only a Poor Old Man Well-Known Member

    Interesting. I didn't know that my coin is unusual. Now I like it a bit more!
     
  16. jfreakofkorn

    jfreakofkorn Well-Known Member

    Cool looking coin . . .
     
  17. Sulla80

    Sulla80 Well-Known Member

    Here's another for the collection
    Istros Drachm blu.jpg Moesia, Istros, AR drachm, circa 350 BC
    Size: 5.31g, 17.8mm, 12h or 6h
    Obv:Two young male heads facing, side by side, the one on left inverted
    Rev: Sea-eagle standing left on back of dolphin left which it attacks with its beak, IΣTPIH above, I below the eagle's tail, AΓ ligatured below dolphin
    Ref: apparently unpublished variety, AMNG pp 159-164, Sear 1169
     
  18. dougsmit

    dougsmit Member

    I wonder how many of the people reading this thread don't realize that you can not rotate one of these coins and change which side shows the inverted head? More likely some have never thought that was a question. I am completely unaware if there is any reason or pattern in these variations. They are not denomination related since the differences are found in the fractions as well.
    For the record, coins of this type do come in fourree and solid barbarous versions (most coins do, it seems).
    g30830bb0363.jpg g30860bb1868.jpg
     
  19. DonnaML

    DonnaML Well-Known Member

    Indeed, you did! Here's mine, followed by a question for our experts on Greek coins.

    Thrace, Istros. 400-350 BCE. AR Drachm. Obv. Two facing male heads, left head inverted / Rev: Sea eagle on dolphin, ISTRIH [partially off flan] above eagle, globule under eagle’s tail; A[?] ligatured beneath dolphin. SNG.BM.249 [Sylloge Nummorum Graecorum, Great Britain, Volume IX, British Museum, Part 1: The Black Sea (London, 1993)]; AMNG I/I No. 417, see also id. No. 422 [Behrendt Pick, Die antiken Münzen von Dacien und Moesien, Die antiken Münzen Nord-Griechenlands Vol. I/I (Berlin, 1898) at pp. 161-162]; BMC 3 Thrace No. 6 [R.S. Poole, ed. A Catalog of the Greek Coins in the British Museum, The Tauric Chersonese, Sarmatia, Dacia, Moesia, Thrace, etc., Vol. 3 (London, 1877) at p. 25]; Seaby 1669 var. [D. Sear, Greek Coins & their Values, Vol. I: Europe (Seaby 1978)]. 19 mm., 5.36 g.

    Istros - drachm - Inverted heads - Eagle attacking dolphin.jpg

    My question is: what is the letter or symbol ligatured to the "A" beneath the dolphin? If you zoom in on the photo by clicking it, the symbol looks basically like the top portion of a backwards Γ (gamma). Does a backwards Γ signify something in Ancient Greek? Here are the relevant portions of the catalogues I cite in my description above, each of which depicts the symbol similarly:

    First, the entry for SNG.BM.249 (unfortunately, it doesn't describe the symbols beneath the dolphin, but they're reasonably clear in the photo):

    Istros inverted heads SNG.BM.249 (citing AMNG I 417).jpg

    Next, the entry for AMNG I/I No. 417 (which is specifically cited further down in the SNG.BM.249 entry). The symbol is depicted at the end of the second line in the right-hand column of the entry:

    Istros inverted heads AMNG I - Pick, Behrendt (Berlin 1898) no. 417 p. 161.jpg

    Next, the entry for AMNG I/I No. 422, which shows a complete backwards Γ ligatured to the A (which actually looks more like a delta!); if you translate the German, the right-hand column of the entry states that "perhaps" the symbol on No. 417 is simply the upper part of the symbol on No. 422.

    Istros inverted heads AMNG I - Pick, Behrendt (Berlin 1898) no. 422 p. 162.jpg

    Finally, the entry for BMC 3 Thrace No. 6; see the right-hand column of the entry:

    BMC vol.  3 p. 25 Istros - inverted heads No. 6.jpg

    (By the way, the numbers in the first two columns of the BMC entry are in grains and inches rather than grams and millimeters: 84 grains = 5.442 g., and 0.8" = approx. 20 mm.)

    So: does anyone have any idea what the mysterious symbol ligatured to the "A" signifies?
     
  20. DonnaML

    DonnaML Well-Known Member

    @maridvnvm, I'm curious as to what makes this a "stater" rather than a "drachm." What is the weight? I know that the entry for this coin-type in Sear's Greek Coins Vol. I -- No. 1669 -- calls it a stater, but the approximate weight it gives is only 5.75 g., which seems awfully light for a stater, and is in the exact same weight range as what most sources describe as a drachm. (Like mine described above, which weighs 5.36 g.) I'm sure that the term "stater" had different meanings in different localities, but my understanding is that in general staters were the approximate equivalent in weight to an Attic didrachm, although in Corinth the stater actually equalled three drachms in monetary terms. (See Wikipedia, which I know is not a reliable source in and of itself, but states that "The three most important standards of the ancient Greek monetary system were the Attic standard, based on the Athenian drachma of 4.3 grams of silver, the Corinthian standard based on the stater of 8.6 grams of silver, that was subdivided into three silver drachmas of 2.9 grams, and the Aeginetan stater or didrachm of 12.2 grams, based on a drachma of 6.1 grams.") In any event, my Corinthian stater weighs 8.46 g., and I'd be interested in knowing where staters weighed in the 5 gram range, never mind being only around 20 mm. or less.
     
    Last edited: Jun 6, 2020
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  21. DonnaML

    DonnaML Well-Known Member

    I would like to believe that anyone who actually considered the question by mentally visualizing the rotation would realize that if the inverted head is on the left one way, it's still going to be on the left even if you turn the coin upside-down. Even though the inverted head won't be the same one that it was before.
     
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