PTOLEMY III GOLD MNAIEION / OCTODRACHM – POSTHUMOUS ISSUE TO PAY TROOPS AT BATTLE OF RAPHIA PUBLISHED IN OLIVIER & LORBER – VF NGC GRADED GREEK PTOLEMAIC COIN (Inv. 17313)

$18,500.00

17313. EGYPT, PTOLEMAIC KINGDOM. PTOLEMY III, 246–222 BC.
Gold Mnaieion (Octodrachm), 27.70 g, 27 mm. Posthumous commemorative issue struck by Ptolemy IV, ca. 219–217 BC.
Obv. Radiate bust of Ptolemy III, wearing aegis and holding trident over his left shoulder. Rev. BAΣIΛEΩΣ ΠTOΛEMAIOY, cornucopia wrapped with radiate royal diadem, ΔI below.
CPE, 888; Svoronos, 1117; Olivier & Lorber, “Three gold coinages of third–century Ptolemaic Egypt” in RBN 159 (2013), 167 (Obv 4/ Rev 15) (this coin cited).
Ex Kölner Münzkabinett 115, 10/29/2021, lot 140 = Kricheldorf XXIII, 6/21/1971, lot 55 = Hirsch 43, 6/21/1965, lot 1261. Kölner Münzkabinett suggested that this is the same coin as that from the Consul Weber collection, J. Hirsch XXI, 11/16/1908, lot 4497, however, this is unlikely despite the very poor reproduction of the cast in the Hirsch sale.
NGC graded VF, Strike 5/5, Surface 3/5, “graffito.”

This impressive coin honors the deified Ptolemy III Euergetes, who famously invaded many parts of the Seleucid Empire during the Third Syrian War (246–241 BC), absorbing large sections of western and southern Asia Minor, as well as parts of Syria into the Ptolemaic Kingdom. It was struck under Ptolemy IV as a means of comparing him to his triumphant father after the former achieved his own impressive victory over the Seleucid king Antiochus III at the Battle of Raphia on June 22, 217 BC. Early in the battle, the larger Indian Seleucid war elephants defeated Ptolemy’s smaller African elephants and Antiochus III broke the Ptolemaic left wing, but Ptolemy IV and his queen Arsinoe III managed to rally the remaining phalanx and press on to victory. Gold coins such as this are very likely to have been the prize given to soldiers after the battle and a tool used to spur them to victory. According to 3 Maccabees 1.4, after all seemed lost, “Arsinoe continually went up and down the ranks, and with disheveled hair, with tears and entreaties, begged the soldiers to fight manfully for themselves, their children, and wives; and promised that if they proved conquerors, she would give them two minas of gold apiece. It thus fell out that their enemies were defeated in hand–to–hand encounter, and that many of them were taken prisoners.”