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Doubleshekel
| Issuer | Carthage |
|---|---|
| Year | 264 BC - 241 BC |
| Type | Log in to see details |
| Value | 2 Shekels |
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| Composition | Log in to see details |
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| Obverse description | Draped bust of Tanit (syncretized with Kore-Persephone) facing left, her hair bound with a wreath of barley ears, a characteristic emblem of the goddess's chthonic and fertility associations. She wears a triple-pendant earring and a beaded necklace, rendered in fine Punic-Hellenistic style. The facial features are idealized in the Greek manner, with a softly modeled profile. The field is plain, and the flan edge is slightly irregular as characteristic of hammered production. |
|---|---|
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| Reverse description | A horse standing in proud, alert pose to the right, its mane rendered with a braided or crested ridge along the neck, the tail flowing in a sinuous curve behind. In the upper left field, a prominent eight-rayed star serves as a divine symbol, likely associated with the goddess Tanit or a celestial deity of the Punic pantheon. The composition is contained within a plain, slightly beaded border, and the flan exhibits the irregular outline typical of hand-struck ancient coinage. No legend or exergual inscription is present, consistent with the aniconic textual tradition of Carthaginian coinage of this period. |
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| Additional information |
This denomination was produced to fund the First Punic War — a conflict that drained Carthaginian silver reserves so severely that the city eventually struggled to pay its mercenary armies, a failure that triggered the bloody Mercenary War immediately after the peace with Rome in 241 BC. The double shekel's weight standard reflects Carthage's deliberate alignment with the Sicilian Greek monetary system, a concession to the commercial realities of operating in a contested Mediterranean theater where interoperability with Greek coinage mattered.