Indentifying A Greek Silver Coin

Yes, friend. But I believe it would be AE in that case.

Thank you my friend!!

I'm not super knowledgeable about Prutahs and Leptons, but two things are odd about this coin:

1. The star/wheel design element appears to be on both sides. I thought that these coins should have an anchor on one side and the star on the other. Maybe the first pic actually shows an anchor?

2. This coin is made from a white metal (silver or lead I don't know). I thought that these were all made from bronze. @rsferreira, could you determine the size and mass to figure out the density of the metal?

There is a Trihemiobol on Wildwinds that has a somewhat similar wheel pattern on one side along with a patterned round Macedonian shield on the other side that kinda looks like what you have. Here is the link (8th one down):

http://www.wildwinds.com/coins/gree...donia/i.html


Hopefully Bob will weigh in soon as he is much better at this stuff than I am...

Just to chime in with an opinion or two:




Interestingly, Alexander Jannaeus did issue lead coins during a short period of his reign, including of the star/anchor variety. The lead version is, specifically, the Hendin 1153.a. (Many folks call these lepta, but Hendin still refers to them in his 5th edition as prutot) But, in any event, I believe prsferreira is probably correct that the above coin is silver.

To me, the obvious casting sprue (right side of the coin in the upper pic) suggests Judaea and not a Greek state that issued stars with rays. It's very common to see this shaped sprue on widow mites. And, while stars with eight rays were more common, it is not uncommon to see widow's mites with six rays.




I believe so, Dave. In some examples, the "arms" of the anchors stretched pretty wide, and occasionally there is also sometimes what Hendin refers to as a "nipple" raised in the center. This was actually from the hole drilled into stone from which the blank flans were cast. This is seen in this example, below, (incidentally, also showing a star with six rays) and in the OP coin.



Here's what I think: I could very well be way off, but the surface of the OP coin screams cast to me. More specifically I believe the pocked/pitted surface we see suggests sand casting. In my opinion what we have here is a modern silver cast of an Alexander Jannaeus prutah/lepton, Hendin 1153. I don't know if it was done to deceive - seems that casting in bronze would make more sense if that were the case. Or perhaps just as an experiment by someone?

Anyway, that's just my opinion.

@bob is the best!