Wreathed Apollo

Sale: CNG 79, Lot: 154. Estimate $500.  Closing Date: Wednesday, 17 September 2008.  Sold For $355. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

KINGS of MACEDON. Philip II. 359-336 BC. AR 1/5 Tetradrachm (2.43 g, 6h). Uncertain Macedonian mint (Amphipolis?). Posthumous issue, struck under Kassander, Philip IV, or Alexander (son of Kassander), circa 315-294 BC. Head of Apollo right, wearing laurel wreath / Youth on horseback right; tripod below. Le Rider pl. 48, 13; SNG ANS 827-8. Near EF. Very rare issue with wreathed Apollo.

This issue with the tripod control mark is the only time in this series of 1/5 tetradrachms when Apollo is wearing a wreath, rather than the canonical tainia. The wreathed portrait combined with the tripod suggests a special emission related to games. However, at present, the mint attribution is too uncertain (see Le Rider, p. 399), and the dating too broad, to link this type with any particular event.