Lot 86
Lot 30086 > ARABIAN PENINSULA. Uncertain mint. Ca. late 3rd century BC. AR tetradrachm (28mm, 16.92 gm, 2h). NGC Choice XF S 5/5 - 4/5, flan flaw. Late posthumous issue of Gerrha/Icarus, ca. 250 BC. Head of Heracles right, wearing lion skin headdress, paws tied before neck / ΛΛEΞΛNΔPOV (N retrograde), Shams seated left on backless throne, right leg drawn back, feet on ground line, eagle in right hand, scepter in left; ΣΒΥ (Shams, Musnad/Southern Arabian) in left field. Price -, cf. 3957 (Σ (shin in Arabic, oriented horizontally) in left field). Huth 106a. Arnold-Biucchi, Arabian, pl. 18, 3. HGC 10, 697. Note from Price, p.495 "The hoard from Failaka in Kuwait enabled Mørkholm to show that the varieties 3957-8, which would normally be termed barbarous, were regular issues from the Arabian peninsula. Failaka itself may now be equated with the ancient Ikaros, but the prominent 'Greek' city in the area was Gerrha, and it was probably there that the Alexander issues were made". Gerrha became the regional leading power after the rebellion of Molon in 222 BC, causing the Seleucids to lose their influence in the area, and asserted their power by striking their own coinage in the name of Alexander, but also with the local deity Shams in the field. Price only lists three coins for Gerrha and none with Shams fully spelled out as on this example. Abi'el of Gerrha, and some local tribes, struck a series of tetrdrachms, drachms and obols in his name (HGC 10, 686-691), and other territories in the region soon followed Gerrha's lead, with Icarus/Failaka striking tetradrachms and obols with just the abbreviation 'shin' (Arabic) for Shams vertically or horizontally (Price 3957-9), along with two Arabian chieftains, Abyatha (ca. 240-220 BC) and Harithat (ca. 180-160 BC), striking coins in their own names (HGC 10, 692-695). Extremely rare - 8 known and of considerable historic importance with the deity fully spelled out, and only three examples in private hands (the others being three in Bahrain Museum, one in BN Paris, one in Vienna). Cf. Classical Numismatic Group, Triton XVI (8 January 2013), lot 576 for the only other known example sold publicly (realized $35,000).
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