Lot 5053

Description

Thraco-Macedonian Tribe, The Derrones, c.475-450 B.C., silver dodecadrachm (37.24 gm), obv. male driver seated in ox cart moving to left, holding goad in raised right hand and reins in left, a crested Corinthian helmet in field above ox, plain under ox, rev. triskeles of human legs, (S.1315 [£6500], cf.Svoronos 15-17 [p.8], pl. II, 1-4 [similar dies]. cf.AMNG III/2 [p.56, 7] and pl. xxv, 18 [similar dies]). Svoronos reports four examples from similar dies (they being of lighter weight), the reverse weakly struck as typical for this series, otherwise very fine and very rare, these dies unpublished.

The Derrones were a Thraco-Macedonian tribe that lived in the Pangei (Pernar) mountains, on the river Strymon in Macedon. Types exist with the ox cart going to left and others to the right. Recent hoards and other earlier finds suggest less than 100 of these large silver similar type coins survive today.