Catalog
See full images - free registration
Continue with Google - no registration!
or register with email
Why register? Just to keep bots out of our catalog. Your email stays private - we will never share it or send you anything uninvited. We guarantee you that!
Hemidrachm
| Issuer | Thessalian League |
|---|---|
| Year | 470 BC - 460 BC |
| Type | Standard circulation coin |
| Value | Log in to see details |
| Currency | Log in to see details |
| Composition | Log in to see details |
| Weight | Log in to see details |
| Diameter | Log in to see details |
| Thickness | Log in to see details |
| Shape | Log in to see details |
| Technique | Log in to see details |
| Orientation | Log in to see details |
| Engraver(s) | Log in to see details |
| In circulation to | Log in to see details |
| Reference(s) | Log in to see details |
| Obverse description | Forepart of a prancing horse to right, depicted in high relief emerging from a rocky outcrop, rendered in the archaic Greek artistic tradition. The horse's musculature and forward motion are conveyed with vigorous simplicity, with the forelegs raised and the mane suggested by incised lines. The flan is characteristically irregular and the field is plain and unadorned. |
|---|---|
| Obverse script | Log in to see details |
| Obverse lettering | Log in to see details |
| Reverse description | Log in to see details |
| Reverse script | Log in to see details |
| Reverse lettering | Log in to see details |
| Edge | Log in to see details |
| Mint | Log in to see details |
| Mintage | ND (470 BC - 460 BC) |
| Additional information |
The Thessalian League's federal coinage of this period is among the earliest examples of a Greek regional authority issuing coins collectively rather than through individual poleis — a political arrangement that was far from stable. Thessaly's aristocratic ruling class, the Aleuadae and Scopadae families, exerted fractious control over the league's federal institutions throughout the fifth century, and federal issues were intermittent as a result.
BCD Thessaly II 8 places this hemidrachm among the earliest federal emissions, predating the more prolific series of the fourth century by decades.