★ Coin on Coin? ★

MYSIA. Kyzikos. Hekte (Electrum, 12 mm, 2.63 g). Youthful archaic male head to left on disk; [below, tunny swimming to left]. Rev. Quadripartite incuse square. BMFA 1476. Von Fritze 105. Very rare. A few light scratches, otherwise, nearly very fine.

From a German collection assembled during the second half of the 20th century, acquired from Hess 251, 7 May 1981, 70.

The curious way the head on the obverse is shown on a disc could mean one of two things: 1) it might be a representation of a coin (!!) or, 2) it could be the depiction of a shield with the head as its device. In fact, given how large the head is in relation to the disc, it must be a coin (a shield device would be smaller and central with wide borders). Thus, what we have here is one of the earliest (the earliest?) known depictions of "a coin on a coin".