Help With ID On A Parthian Coin

I think that design was only issued in silver, and should weigh about 4 grams. Maybe a cast copy that was put in a lot to just get rid of it? Does the edge have a casting seam?

I agree it looks like Mithradates II.

Steve is of course correct. (He's a serious collector of Parthians and knows the series well!) It's an AE chalkous of Mithra II, Sellwood 27.13.

Description would be:
AE Chalkous
Mint: Rhagae
Obv: long-bearded bust left wearing diadem; behind bust, Greek letters above monogram; circular border of pellets
Rev: bow in case; no border; five-line Greek inscription

Thank you, Steve, for pointing out that Mithra II was regal-looking, not ugly. My avatar told me he was deeply offended by pendrak's description.

Here's a clearer example:

It is the Greek letters MI (mu-iota) above a monogram. See below, from David Sellwood's The Coinage of Parthia.

The monogram is #107 in Fred Shore's Parthian Coins and History: Ten Dragons Against Rome, and is likely associated with the mint Rhagae, near present day Tehran:





This is a five line legend that translates, roughly, as "(Of the) Great King of Kings, Arsakes, the Noble":







The Parthian bronze issues are definitely less popular than the prettier silver issues. The last sentence of the following paragraph, from a short introduction to collecting the series that I wrote a few years back, says it all:

"Denominations minted in bronze include the chalkous, dichalkous, and tetrachalkous. Whereas the reverse design of the silver drachms was standardized throughout the series, the reverses of coins from the bronze denominations display a wide range of imagery: Greek gods, fortresses, cornucopiae, kantharoi, horses, rams, elephants, camels, bulls, eagles, etc. Bronze Parthian coins, although quite varied and very collectible, are typically found in sorrowful shape, with weak strikes and much wear."

Albert,

Second question first:



The "MI" is above the monogram, not part of the monogram itself...as far as I know, the shapes of the monogram - and all Parthian monograms - is incidental. Here, this particular MI and monogram combination may be easier to see in these examples:


On pendrak's coin, and in the earlier example of the type that I illustrated, the "M" was so small that it looks almost like a little "X" since it's probably just described with dots.

As for the first question:



Not that I know of. Bear in mind that only a handful of Parthian kings actually included their personal names on their coins. Here's part of my article that may be of interest:

"Apart from the inclusion of some Aramaic on early issues, and some Parthian Pahlavi on late issues, reverse legends were written mostly in Greek - and exclusively in Greek on tetradrachms for the duration of the dynasty. In those legends the current ruler is usually referred to as Arsakes, rather than by his personal name. Exceptions include some drachms issued by Vonones I and Gotarzes II, and tetradrachms of Vologases II. "Arsakes" is thus essentially a title, like Caesar, and its usage as a reference to the current king obviously served to legitimize that king's rule by tying it to the dynasty's founder - just as the depiction of a "royal wart" on the obverse portrait was often used as a visual symbol denoting a legitimate familial tie to the Arsacid dynasty. As you might imagine, the lack of use of personal names has created headaches for numismatists trying to decisively attribute Parthian coins."

thanks Bob, for your quick answer .The M I is clearly above the monogram .
For my second question , it is an intaglio ,not a coin , I bought last year for peanuts last year on a trip in the near east ( for me as Belgian it is very,very cheap as you see the price of ticket).Maybe I can post a photo of it here ?
For the monograns , I really appreciate the art of these celetors to hide a lot of data in these combinations of letters.It is great to see the possibilities of combinations they give with a few of letters .
Thanks , at to morrow ( it is 10.30 pm here). albert

Thank you Bob for your reply. I now understand why I could not find more information after your first ID post. The problem is not rarity but quality. There are collectors out there- but finding quality coins to collect of this type is hard- thus not a lot of pics on the internet.
I guess that this will be a keeper coin. I usually do not keep Greek or other coins that I find in Roman lots. I usually try to find someone that appreciates it better than me. It will probably be hard to find someone that wants this one for a proper price. Too many pretty silver ones available!
This coin does have lots of detail- one of those "looks better in hand" coins. Thank you for sending details- I can now see all the legends from your post- both obverse and reverse. Thanks. I have included pics from my camera. Scanner pics suk and my camera pics are a bit fuzzy and make it look like the coin has been cleaned- Thanks again-