PTOLEMAIC KINGS OF EGYPT. Ptolemy I Soter, As satrap, 323-305 BC. Half Stater (Gold, 13 mm, 4.25 g, 1 h), in the types of Alexander III of Macedon. Kyrene, Theupheides, magistrate, circa 312-311. KYPANΑΙ Head of Athena to right, wearing crested Corinthian helmet decorated with a coiled serpent, single pendant earring and pearl necklace. Rev. ΠΤΟΛΕ Nike standing front, head to left, with her wings spread, holding laurel wreath in her right hand and stylis in her left; in upper left field, [ΘE]Y; below right wing, silphion plant. BMC -. CPE 257A = M. Thompson: Some noteworthy Greek accessions, in: ANSMN 12 (1966), p. 14 and pl. II, 18 (same dies). Naville -. SNG Copenhagen -. Svoronos -. Of the highest rarity, apparently the second known example. Numerous minor marks and light scratches and with a test cut on the reverse, otherwise, nearly very fine.



Few coins of the early Hellenistic age bring together as many influences as this exceptionally rare and highly unusual Ptolemaic half-stater. Its origins lie in Ptolemy’s campaigns in Kyrenaica. With the power struggle among Alexander’s generals looming, and the immediate threat posed by Perdikkas advancing from the east, the Egyptian satrap could not afford to leave his western flank exposed. In 322 he therefore dispatched his general Ophellas to the region, where the mercenary leader Thibron was eliminated and the Greek cities were brought under Ptolemaic control. When Kyrene rebelled in 313 against Ophellas, now installed as governor, Ptolemy sent reinforcements the following year and the revolt was crushed.

It was in this context that the issue of this coinage took place. The series adopts the familiar iconography of the Alexander staters, but in an unusual departure also includes extremely rare half-staters such as the present piece. On the reverse, instead of following the Diadochi’s usual practice - before their assumption of the royal title in 306/5 BC - of issuing in the name of Alexander III or Philip III (323-317), it names Ptolemy himself, together with the mint official Theupheides. Even more striking, the obverse - normally left without legend - displays, beside the head of Athena, the ethnic of the minting city: Kyrene, the leading polis of Kyrenaica, only recently reconquered. Equally remarkable, a small sprig of silphion, the traditional emblem of Kyrene, appears next to the Nike: a further, highly unusual allusion to the minting city.

What we have here, then, is the Alexander type, struck under Ptolemy by Ophellas in the city of Kyrene, and with it a remarkable numismatic witness to a clear hierarchy running from king to satrap to general to polis. Through this powerful iconography, the coin proclaims the subjugation of the rebellious city by the authority of the Egyptian satrap - who only a few years later would crown himself as basileus and pharaoh, founding a dynasty that endured for nearly three centuries. The issue itself must have been extremely short-lived, as its great rarity today makes clear. Soon afterwards Ophellas turned to the striking of civic staters that omit Ptolemy’s name, yet with their types of Nike driving a quadriga and a standing Zeus Ammon (see lot 104 below) they continued to project a triumphal iconography.