SIKYONIA, Sikyon. Circa 350-330/20 BC. AR Obol (10.5mm, 0.81 g, 12h). Dove alighting right, holding fillet in beak / Dove flying right; ΣI above tail. BCD Peloponnesos 245; HGC 5, 225. Faint cleaning marks. Near EF. Well centered.
Located in the northeast of the Peloponnesos, Sikyonia was a fertile territory stretching some sixteen miles. Sikyon, the area’s most important city and one of the Mediterranean’s most well-renowned artistic centers, was the site where legend holds that Prometheus famously deceived Zeus. The city joined Sparta during the Peloponnesian War and provided the bulk of the coinage used by the Peloponnesian League. In 303 BC, Demetrios Poliorketes re-founded Sikyon further inland, giving it the short-lived name of Demetrias. Sikyon’s output of coinage was large and uninterrupted from the 5th-1st centuries BC. The city’s status was diminished when Corinth was made a Roman colony and, aside from a small issue under Nero, Sikyon did not mint coins until the reign of Septimius Severus.
