MYSIA. Lampsakos. Circa 350 BC. Stater (Gold, 17 mm, 7.90 g, 3 h), reduced Persian standard. Laureate and bearded head of Zeus to left, with lotus-tipped scepter over his right shoulder. Rev. Forepart of Pegasos to right within shallow incuse square. Baldwin, Lampsakos, 29c and pl. II, 32-33 (I/β). Gulbenkian 691 (same dies). SNG Paris 1137. SNG von Aulock 7394. Traité II, pl. CLXXI, 3. Rare. A magnificent example of splendid late Classical style, beautifully struck in high relief and with a particularly noble and serene head of Zeus. A few light marks on the reverse, otherwise, extremely fine.



Lampsakos grew wealthy through maritime trade, but its strategic position at the eastern entrance to the Hellespont also made it a prize for the great powers of the Classical and Hellenistic periods - above all Athens, Sparta, Persia, and later the Diadochi - all of whom sought control of the strait. Brief intervals of independence thus alternated with long stretches of foreign domination, a fate the city shared with many of its neighbours. What distinguishes Lampsakos from the other poleis of the region, however, is its remarkable electrum and gold coinage. Most Greek cities issued civic coinage in electrum or gold only rarely, and usually only in moments of acute crisis, when temple or civic treasures had to be melted down. Lampsakos, by contrast, produced such coinage in significant quantity: first a series of electrum staters from the late sixth into the fifth century BC (see lot 179 above), and later an impressive run of gold staters in the fourth century. The long duration of these issues, together with the wide variety of types, shows that this was a regular coinage, as at Kyzikos, though the fact that the later series was struck in gold rather than electrum suggests a somewhat different underlying context.

Lampsakos possessed its own gold mines, and its fourth-century staters were generally struck on a standard corresponding to the Persian daric, at 8.3-8.45 g, the dominant gold coinage of the age. A small group of Lampsakene staters, however, including the present example, was struck to a reduced standard of about 7.90 g (see also Numismatica Ars Classica 100, 29 May 2017, 150, from the same dies). This may reflect a temporary shortage of bullion, especially since the same die pair was also used to strike staters on the full Persian standard.

That Lampsakene staters were used for military expenditure and for wider 'international' payments, much like the Persian darics, is suggested by two inscriptions recording contributions by Byzantion to Thebes during the Third Sacred War (355-346 BC) of 84 and 500 χρουσίω Λαμψακανῶ στ̣[ατεῖρας] ('Lampsakene gold staters'; IG VII 2418). These sums appear impressive at first sight, yet Baldwin recorded only 132 surviving examples of all types, which strongly suggests that the staters of Lampsakos remained a regional coinage and never rivalled the Persian daric on a larger scale, of which thousands survive. The artistic quality of the Lampsakene dies, on the other hand, is extraordinary. The Zeus staters in particular are of striking beauty, and Agnes Baldwin wrote enthusiastically of this obverse die - the first of the series - that 'we have among the obverses one die which is a most perfect die, artistically one of the finest representations of a Zeus head on this scale among Greek coins.'.