198, Lot: 190. Estimate $150. Sold for $155. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

ISLANDS off IONIA, Chios. Pseudo-autonomous issue. 1st-2nd centuries AD. Æ Hemiassarion (15mm, 1.51 g, 6h). Sphinx seated left, forepaw on prow / Kantharos. Mavrogordato 108; SNG Copenhagen 1647 var. (denomination); SNG von Aulock -. Near VF, green patina.

The sphinx served as the badge of Chios. Of Egyptian or Mesopotamian origin, the Sphinx, or "strangler" was a winged hybrid monster with the body of a lioness and a female head. She figured prominently in one of the myths connected with Oedipus, and the the aphorism “riddle of the Sphinx” came to define any seemingly unanswerable question. The kantharos refers to the area’s importance as a wine-producing region.