CNG 99, Lot: 162. Estimate $500. Sold for $425. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

BITHYNIA, Herakleia Pontike. Dionysios. Tyrant, 337-305 BC. AR Siglos or Drachm (18mm, 4.47 g, 12h). Wreathed head of Dionysos left, with thyrsos over shoulder / Herakles standing left, lion’s skin over left arm, adding spear held in right hand to trophy. SNG BM Black Sea 1612; HGC 7, 501. Good VF, toned, some porosity.

A civil struggle in Herakleia led to the founding of a tyranny by Klearchos in 364 BC, who ruled until his assassination in 352. He was followed by a six year regency of his brother, Satyreos, until Klearchos’ son, Timotheos, came of age in 346. Timotheos shortly thereafter raised his younger brother, Dionysios, as a joint ruler, and Dionysios remained tyrant of Herakleia after the death of Timotheus in 337, until his own passing in 305. The dynasty continued under his sons until Lysimachos seized the city in 284 BC. The family of Klearchos seems to have have had a special attachment to the god Dionysos; Klearchos named one of his sons after the god, the deity was the standard type for the coinage of the dynasty, and Klearchos was even assassinated while at the temple of Dionysos. Although the dynasty continued to rule until 284 BC, the coinage ceased to bear the names of the tyrants shortly after the accession of Dionysios, probably at the time of the arrival of Alexander in Asia Minor in 334 BC. Such expressions of autonomy were not viewed favorably by the new master of the Greek east.