Sunday, September 11, 2016

Strangest ancient coin I've seen this month

A very unusual reverse on an ancient Greek diobol! The reverse side literally depicts the lion's tail end.

Typically on ancient Greek coins it is the front half of the animal that appears. The front half is called a 'protome'. There is no word for the back half appearing, as there hasn't been a need.

From today's Numismatik Naumann auction (lot 181). I am neither the buyer or seller.

1 comment:

Ed Snible said...

I noticed today that this is not a unique type. An example appears in Nancy Waggoner's catalog of the Rosen collection (#736) and is now part of the ANS collection.

Waggoner suspected Rosen's coin was unique.