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Hemidrachm
| Issuer | Melos (Cyclades) |
|---|---|
| Year | 400 BC - 300 BC |
| Type | Standard circulation coin |
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| Composition | Log in to see details |
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|---|---|
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| Reverse description | Nude youthful male figure, identified tentatively as Herakles, kneeling on his right knee and facing right, depicted in the act of drawing a bow. The archer's body is rendered in an energetic, dynamic pose characteristic of late Classical Greek die engraving. No legend accompanies the figure. The composition fills the flan compactly, with the figure occupying the central field against a plain background. The style is consistent with Cycladic workshop production of the 4th century BC. |
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| Edge | Plain |
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| Additional information |
Melos sat awkwardly in the Aegean throughout the fifth and fourth centuries — nominally Dorian, stubbornly neutral, and ultimately destroyed for it. The Athenians besieged the island in 416 BC, executed the adult men, and enslaved the population, an event Thucydides recorded through the famously cold Melian Dialogue. Coinage resumed only after Lysander's campaigns effectively ended Athenian imperial reach, which places the earliest issues of this series squarely in the aftermath of catastrophic depopulation and Spartan resettlement.
The hemidrachm denomination suggests a local economy rebuilding on modest terms.