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Stater
| Issuer | Thourioi |
|---|---|
| Year | 281 BC - 268 BC |
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| Shape | Round (irregular) |
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| Obverse description | Laureate head of Apollo facing right, rendered in fine classical Greek style with naturalistic facial features and softly modelled hair beneath an elaborate wreath of laurel leaves and berries. The wreath is densely worked, with multiple overlapping sprays extending prominently behind the head. The portrait is set without legend against a broad, smooth field, occupying the full flan in the manner typical of late Italiote silver coinage. |
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| Reverse description | A bull charging to the left, head lowered in a butting posture, with a small figure of a fish or marine creature visible beneath the groundline, referencing the river god Sybaris or the local hydrological symbolism of Thourioi. The ethnic legend API / ΘΟΥΡΙ / ΩΝ (abbreviation of ARISTOKRATOS and city ethnonym ΘΟΥΡΙΩΝ) is distributed in the field above and below the bull, with letters appearing to the upper right and in the exergual area below the groundline. The composition is bold and energetic, characteristic of the Italiote die-cutting tradition. |
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| Additional information |
Thourioi, founded in 444/3 BC as a Panhellenic colony on the site of destroyed Sybaris, came under increasing pressure from Lucanian and then Bruttian incursions through the fourth century. By the time this stater was struck, the city was in its final decades of meaningful independence, having already appealed to Sparta and then Rome for military assistance against its neighbours. Rome's intervention in the 280s effectively drew Thourioi into the orbit that would soon trigger the Pyrrhic War.
The series to which this piece belongs represents the city's last substantial silver coinage before Roman dominance rendered local autonomous striking largely redundant.