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Oktadrachm - Alexander I
| Issuer | Kingdom of Macedonia |
|---|---|
| Year | 465 BC - 460 BC |
| Type | Log in to see details |
| Value | Log in to see details |
| Currency | Drachm |
| Composition | Log in to see details |
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| Obverse description | A Macedonian horseman advances slowly to the right, depicted on foot and leading his horse by the reins. The figure is dressed in a short chlamys and wears the characteristic flat-brimmed Macedonian causia; he carries two spears, one held upright and one at rest. The style is archaic, rendered with bold linear contours typical of early Macedonian coinage. The field is plain, with no legend or exergual inscription. |
|---|---|
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| Reverse script | Greek |
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| Additional information |
Alexander I of Macedon spent much of his reign navigating between Persian imperial pressure and the growing power of the southern Greek city-states. His heavy silver coinage — produced at a scale unusual for a northern kingdom at this date — almost certainly reflects control of the timber and silver mines of the Mount Dysoron region, resources explicitly noted by Thucydides. The octadrachm denomination itself was peculiar to the northern Aegean and never took hold further south.
Alexander had earlier served the Persians as a nominal vassal during Xerxes' invasion, a status later Greeks found uncomfortable enough that he sought — and obtained — recognition as ethnically Hellenic to compete at Olympia.