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Nomos
| Issuer | Metapontion |
|---|---|
| Year | 290 BC - 280 BC |
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| Composition | Silver |
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| Obverse description | Draped bust of Demeter facing right, her hair bound with a wreath of grain ears, adorned with a triple-pendant earring and a beaded necklace. A secondary grain wreath is depicted behind her neck, emphasizing her role as goddess of the harvest. The portraiture is rendered in the refined South Italian style characteristic of late fourth- to early third-century BCE Metapontine coinage, with careful attention to facial modeling and decorative detail. |
|---|---|
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| Reverse script | Greek |
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| Additional information |
Metapontion's coinage declined sharply after the city allied with Hannibal during the Second Punic War, but this nomos predates that catastrophe by roughly a century, belonging instead to a period when the city was navigating the turbulent aftermath of Pyrrhus's campaigns in southern Italy. The agricultural wealth of the Metapontine plain — among the most productive grain-producing territory in Magna Graecia — underwrote a mint that remained active and technically accomplished long after many neighboring poleis had ceased independent coinage.
HN Italy 1627 places this issue in the final decade of the city's most prolific minting phase.