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Tetradrachm Kreuzelreiter Type
| Issuer | Uncertain Eastern European Celts |
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| Year | 300 BC - 201 BC |
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| Composition | Log in to see details |
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| Diameter | 25 mm |
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| Obverse description | Stylized male head facing left, rendered in the characteristic Celtic La Tène artistic idiom derived from the Macedonian prototype of Philip II. The hair is depicted as deeply engraved, flowing parallel ridges sweeping back from the forehead, terminating in large pellet-tipped locks behind the neck. A diadem composed of a beaded string is visible arcing across the crown of the head. The facial features are abstracted, with a prominent, bulbous eye rendered in high relief, a stylized ear indicated by a pellet, and a boldly projecting curved element suggesting the nose and chin. The field is plain and the flan is irregular, consistent with hand-struck Celtic coinage of this period. |
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| Reverse description | A horse prancing left in a highly stylized Celtic rendering, with elongated, segmented legs rendered as individual strokes and a schematic, elongated body. Above the horse's back, a rider is suggested by a large pellet-and-arc device, characteristic of the Kreuzelreiter (cross-rider) type, consisting of a cross-shaped or wheel-like symbol formed of pellets and bars, representing the highly abstracted degeneration of the original Macedonian horseman motif. An additional pellet or globule is visible below the horse's belly and near the hindquarters. The composition fills the flan without a surrounding legend, the field showing the flat, irregular surface typical of Celtic hammered silver coinage. |
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| Additional information |
The "Kreuzelreiter" — a German collector term meaning roughly "cross-rider" — belongs to a wave of Celtic coinage derived from Macedonian prototypes, particularly the Philip II tetradrachm types that flooded Eastern Europe following Alexander's campaigns. Attribution remains contested; candidates include tribal groups in the Carpathian basin and the lower Danube region, none of whom left written records of their minting activity.
What makes this type analytically frustrating is the deliberate abstraction applied over successive die generations — each copying from the last rather than from the original prototype, producing increasingly schematized imagery. The Preda references place production within the Dacian and Getian geographic sphere.