Sale: Triton IX, Lot: 417. Estimate $15000.  Closing Date: Monday, 9 January 2006.  Sold For $37500. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

BOIOTIA, Thebes. Circa 450-440 BC. AR Stater (12.18 g). Boiotian shield / Female figure (Harmonia?), wearing long chiton, seated right, holding crested Corinthian helmet in her left hand, right hand on her hip, left foot resting on a footstool; (archaic Q)EBA upward on left; all within square incuse. Head, Boeotia p. 32, pl. II, 10 = BMC p. 72, 42, pl. XII, 10 = Traité III 233, pl. CC, 2 (same rev. die); Myron Hoard pl. A, 31 (same dies); SNG Manchester 921. Good VF, even tone, excellent metal quality. Extremely rare. ($15,000)

This charming coin was part of IGCH 45 which also included a Phocis hemidrachm (Williams, Silver Coinage of the Phokians [London, 1972], 259) in pristine condition. Williams considers 418 BC as the most likely date for the issue of the hemidrachm (Williams p. 40) and this, given that the stater is in a category of coins which were not in daily use and therefore would wear at a slow rate, would agree with the lower end of the chronology bracket suggested above for the Theban piece.