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Greek coins, Bruttium, Caulonia, Nomos

Currency:CHF Category:Coins & Paper Money / Coins: Ancient Start Price:19,200.00 CHF Estimated At:24,000.00 - 30,000.00 CHF
Greek coins, Bruttium, Caulonia, Nomos
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Greek coins, Bruttium, Caulonia, Nomos ca. 525-500, AR 8.30 g. KAVL Apollo, diademed, walking r., holding laurel branch in upraised r. hand and small running daimon, holding long branch on outstretched l. arm; in r. field, stag r. on platform, with head reverted. Rev. The same type incuse l. without legend. SNG ANS 142 (these dies). Gulbenkian 119 (these dies). Noe 5e (this coin). Historia Numorum Italy 2035. Rare. A superb specimen of this desirable issue. Wonderful old cabinet tone and good extremely fine Ex Hirsch XVI, 1906, 158; Hirsch XXXI, 1912, Gutekunst, 95; Leu 42, 1987, 61 and Leu 61, 1995, 44 sales. The design of the early nomoi of Caulonia has attracted various interpretations, many of which are documented in Barclay Head’s Historia Numorum. Head saw the main figure as the mythical founder of Caulonia, who held a leaf from the plant kaulon as a punning allusion to the city name. Most scholars of the modern era seem to describe the figure as Apollo. The running figure in his hand – whose feet are winged on some examples – is thought by some to be a wind god, perhaps Zephyrus, but is almost universally described as a genius or a daimon, a deity of a lower order which served the higher gods. Perhaps the most attractive explanation is that the figure, Apollo, is shown holding a laurel branch from the Vale of Tempe in Thessaly, and that the small figure is a daimon fulfilling the role of his messenger. If so, the type would reflect the story of how Apollo, after killing the serpent Pytho at Delphi with a well-aimed arrow, exiled himself for seven years of menial labour as penance for his murder; at the end of his period of atonement Apollo purified himself in the sacred grove of bay-trees. Specifically the type would represent his return to Delphi, announced by the daimon-messenger, to assume his oracular duties on behalf of Zeus. It is disturbing that the stag seems to defy explanation – this despite it being an integral part of the design on the earliest coins of the city, and its subsequent adoption as the standard reverse type. The output of the mint at Caulonia was significant, especially considering it was a city of comparatively little significance. It was the last of the Achaean colonies on the Ionian coast to commence striking, and Robinson suggests that its disproportionately high output might be explained by the complete lack of early coinage by its wealthier and more important neighbour Locris.