Leontini
Tetradrachm circa 455-450, AR 17.12 g. Laureate head of Apollo r. Rev. LE – O – N – TI – NO – N Lion's head r., with jaws open and tongue protruding; around, four barley grains. Dewing 624 (these dies). Jameson 628 (these dies). Burlington Art exhibition 1904, 172 (this coin). SNG ANS 219 (these dies). Rizzo, pl. XXIII, 6 and XXIV, 2 (this coin). Jameson 628 (this coin). Boehringer, Studies Price, pl. 11, 34 (these dies). Very rare and possibly the finest specimen in private hands. An interesting and attractive portrait of fine style struck in high relief, wonderful old cabinet tone and extremely fine Ex Leu sale 81, 2001, Abecassis, 78. From the A.J. Evans, R. Jameson and Charles Gillet collections. Leontini was a Chalkidian Greek colony established by Sicilian Naxos in the late eighth century BC. It gained notoriety in c. 608 BC as the first city in Sicily to have its constitution subverted by a tyrant—in this case by a local strong man named Panaitios. The great success enjoyed by Panaitios of Naxos inspired other Sicilian Greeks to establish tyrannies in their own cities, setting a pattern for governance on the island that lasted into the third century BC. Leontinoi suffered the ill-effects of tyrannies through most of the fifth and fourth centuries BC. In c. 496/5 BC, the city was conquered by Hippokrates, the tyrant of Gela. A few decades later, it was subject to Hieron I, the tyrant of Syracuse, and compelled to accept the populations of Katane and Naxos after he expelled them in 476 BC. Only after his death in 466 BC were the Leontines able to restore the Katanaians and Naxians to their homes and recover their own freedom. This wonderfully preserved tetradrachm of Leontini is struck in very high relief and may very well be the finest example in private hands. It was produced in a period of relative peace between the overthrow of the Deinomenid dynasty of tyrants at Syracuse (465 BC) and the assumption of the Syracusan tyranny by Dionysios I in 405 BC. The obverse features a head of the god Apollo that is so beautiful and delicate that it approaches the feminine. If one did not know that the deity in question was Apollo (his identity is given away by the large laurel wreath on his head), the patron of both Chalkidians and colonial foundations, one might almost mistake the head for that of a water nymph with hair falling in what look like wet strands down the side of the head and neck. The reverse type features a dramatic lions head as a punning badge of the city. The Greek word for lion was leon. The four barleycorns that surround the head allude to the richness of Leontinis agricultural territory, but their arrangement reflects the influence of contemporary tetradrachms of Syracuse which depict the head of Aretusa encircled by four dolphins.