Worn ancients need IDs

Blackhawk

Here's a couple of worn ancients that have no IDs. The first is about 15mm in diameter - I don't know about the orientation of the reverse. The second is about 19mm. Both are a bit thicker than other ancients that I have of the same size.

dcamp78

The helmet on the first coin makes me want to say Greek, but I may be wrong.

The second coin's obverse was struck about 20% off center. Probably no letters visible there.
You'd have to ID it by finding the picture of the guy on the front and then match the reverse.

lordmarcovan

<< <i>The helmet on the first coin makes me want to say Greek, but I may be wrong. >>

I'm with you there. That, and its thickness, indicate a BC-era Greek piece. Probably ditto on the second one, but I can't help there.

The goddess (Athena, I think) on the first looks Corinthian? Or at least the helmet style does.

Rickc300

<< <i>I'm with you there. That, and its thickness, indicate a BC-era Greek piece. Probably ditto on the second one, but I can't help there. >>



M'Lord, I thought I was going to be joining you in the quest of ancients and the knowledge of them. I am way off base as far as what I was thinking, (please don't ask, I compared photos and THEN read the posts here). Like I said in an earlier post on another thread, I want to buy attributed coins and learn as I go. This just reaffirms what I have been thinking, I have NO CLUE ! I compare pictures, then try to decipher the writing and still have no idea what I am looking at. Maybe I am just impaired when it comes to deciphering these coins (they are all "Greek" to me)

What made you decide it was a BC, Era Greek piece? Either you are way ahead of me on the learning curve, or you have more knowledge than you are letting on... I thought we were supposed to be learning together?


Whimper, I am going to go look at some old German State stuff just to make myself feel better... At least I can identify that stuff that I come across it. Well, Most of the time! Sometimes? Once in awhile? Grrr... OK, I am going to go seek refuge in my books and maybe fondle an old German state piece... Just to make myself feel better...

Rick

Sapyx

Yup, both Greek/Hellenistic. The pics (or the coins! ) aren't good enough for a positive ID of either.

On the reverse of the first one, I can see at least one dolphin, something else similarly-shaped beneath it, and maybe something above it. At first I thought "Taras" - but they didn't issue many bronzes, none I can see with Athena.

A good candidate might be a "dolphin" bronze from Syracuse:

Can't see anything like a star there though. Another, possibly better candidate is something like this one... Istros, Eagle munching on Dolphin:


For the second one, the sideways Greek writing either side of the standing figure on the reverse is going to tell you the king's name. On the right side I can read "BASILEWS" fairly clearly - the Greek word for "King", which doesn't help much. The word on the left side (the king's actual name) I can't make out. Most likely it's one of the Seleucid kings, or possibly Ptolemaic, Macedonian or one of the other fragments of Alexander's empire. If it's Seleucid, there might be more than one word over there - I think I can see two columns of letters.

Couldn't find a really close match, but this one might give some idea of the layout. This one's from Alexander Balas of the Seleucid kingdom:

(pics from Wildwinds and CoinArchives)