CARTHAGE, Second Punic War. Circa 220-205 BC. EL Three-eighths Shekel (14.5mm, 2.82 g, 12h). Carthage mint. Head of Tanit left, wearing wreath of grain ears, single-pendant earring, and linear necklace with pendants / Horse standing right. Jenkins & Lewis Group XV, 479; CNP 9; cf. MAA 73. Minor die wear, traces of find patina, minor marks. VF.
Ex Carol Ross Collection; Coin Galleries (10 April 1996), lot 35.
Carthage, a Phoenician colony on the coast of North Africa, became a maritime powerhouse in the fifth century BC and challenged the Greek cities of Sicily and Southern Italy for control of the western Mediterranean. By the early third century, much of Sicily had fallen under Carthaginian control and mints were established on the island to produce coins used to pay the largely mercenary army. The stage was now set for the collision with Rome, newly dominant in Italy. Starting in 265 BC, Carthage and Rome fought three titanic wars that produced more death and destruction than any other conflict before the 20th century. This electrum piece, struck at the mother city of Carthage, was produced early in the First Punic War with Rome, which raged for more than 20 years and ended with a humiliating defeat for Carthage and the loss of Sicily to the Romans. Still, Carthage’s empire remained otherwise intact and the loss only laid the groundwork for the similarly destructive Second Punic War. The use of electrum points to the need to stretch Carthage’s gold supply while striking a coinage that would have special appeal to the mercenary soldiers that made up most of its army. A head of the Phoenician goddess Tanit adorns the obverse, while the “Punic horse” symbolic of Carthaginian cavalry stands on the reverse.
