KINGS OF COMMAGENE. Antiochos I Theos, circa 69-34 BC. AE (Bronze, 27 mm, 17.36 g, 1 h), Samosata. BAΣ MEΓ AN[TIOXOY] Zebu bull butting left. Rev. ΣAMOΣATΩ [ΠOΛEΩΣ] City-goddess, turreted and veiled, seated to right on rock, holding palm in her right hand; to lower right, river-god Euphrates swimming right. Alram -. Bedoukian, Commagene, -. RPC I -. Apparently unpublished and unique. A highly interesting issue and of great importance. Minor corrosion and with a die break on the obverse, otherwise, very fine.

The thickness and overall crudeness of the flan make an attribution of this exciting coin to Antiochos IV impossible. It is undoubtedly an issue of Antiochos I Theos and thus confirms his title Megas, previously only known from an uncertain reading of the enigmatic dynastic type of Mithradates II (see the following lot). What makes this coin even more important is that the reverse clearly identifies Samosata as the mint of the Commagene Kingdom. The city had been given to Antiochos I by Pompey, and it served as his capital and produced a small series of autonomous coins of an uncertain (but certainly later) date. This coin, however, is the first example known to combine a royal obverse with a civic reverse and is thus of the highest importance