Hemidrachm - 111st-114th Olympiad

These hemidrachms were struck at Olympia during the period that saw Philip II's assassination and Alexander's seizure of power — the sanctuary continuing to mint as if the political convulsions of the Macedonian court were someone else's problem. The games themselves provided the economic occasion: coinage issued at Olympia served the festival economy, changing hands among traders and pilgrims who converged on the sanctuary every four years.

The SNG Lockett reference traces this piece to the collection of Richard Cyril Lockett, whose dispersal sale ran across multiple sessions from 1955 to 1961 and remains one of the landmark Greek coin auctions of the twentieth century.