weight 16,63gr. | silver Ø 28mm. New Style Coinage.
obv. Head of Athena Parthenos right, wearing triple-crested Athenian helmet, ornamented with pegasos, all within beaded border rev. Owl standing right, head facing, on overturned amphora with letter K, ΔI below, Nikè standing left with wreath in lower right field, A - ΘE, AΦPO - ΔIΣI and AΠO - ΛHΞI across fields, EYMA/PE in lower left field, all within olive-wreathKnown to the ancients as stephanephoroi (wreath-bearers) for their reverse types encircled by olive wreaths, the New Style coinage is now thought to have begun production in circa 166/164 BC. The ″New Style″ tetradrachms were issued by Athens as a semi-autonomous city under Roman rule. The new-style Owls are markedly different from the Owls of Periclean Athens or the ″eye in profile″ Athena head of the Fourth Century. They were struck on thinner, broad flans, typical of the Hellenistic period, with a portrait of Athena that reflected the heroic portraiture of the period. The owl now stands on an amphora, surrounded by magistrates′ names and symbols, all within an olive wreath. The amphora is marked with a letter that may indicate the month of production. Letters below the amphora may indicate the source of the silver used in production. Athenian New Style coinage became the preferred medium of exchange in much of mainland Greece in the later second century BC and enjoyed much popularity in international trade, especially in the Near East.Across the field of the new coins are the names of the two annual magistrates (at first in monogram form), accompanied by a subsidiary type or adjunct symbol, chosen by the magistrate whose name stands first (Macdonald, Coin Types, p. 54). To these two magistrates names there is added during the greater part of the second century (and rarely after circa 100 BC) the name of a third magistrate, which is frequently changed, in some series as many as twelve times, in the course of the period during which the other two principal magistrates hold office. That this period is a year is proved by the numeral letters that are placed on the amphora beneath the owl. It has been conclusively shown (N. C., 1899, p. 288) that these indicate the month of the ordinary or lunar year in which the coins were struck. It is not, however, to be supposed that coins were minted with undeviating regularity year by year, or even month by month, in the years when they were issued. The supply was regulated by the demand. It was only during years of considerable activity that issues bearing all the month numerals Α-Μ (or even Ν in intercalary years, when there were thirteen lunar months) took place.BMC - (cf. 342-343) | Thompson 501e | SNG.Copenhagen - | cf. Sear 2555-2559 | HGC 4, no.1602R Two small test cuts on the reverse. Attractive tone. Rare. vf-
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