SIDE SILVER STATER – ATHENA / NIKE TYPE WITH LAODICEA COUNTERMARK – CHOICE VF NGC GRADED GREEK PAMPHYLIA COIN (Inv. 18643)

$1,650.00

18643. PAMPHYLIA. SIDE. 3rd–2nd CENTURIES BC.
Silver Tetradrachm, 16.41 g, 28 mm.
Obv. Head of Athena right, wearing Corinthian helmet, a large cistophoric countermark of Laodicea applied over the helmet. Rev. Nike moving left, offering wreath, pomegranate above ΔI in left field.
Seyrig, Side 11; SNG BnF 685–688; SNG von Aulock 4779. For countermark see R. Bauslaugh, ‘Cistophoric Countermarks and the monetary system of Eumenes II’ in NC 1990, p. 44.
NGC graded CHOICE VF, Strike 5/5, Surface 3/5, exceptionally clear countermark.

This is one of the many cistophoric countermarks applied to the coinage of Side. It bears, as usual, the bow in bow–case symbol and the letters ΛΑΟ, for the city of Laodicea in Phrygia. These countermarks allowed the old Attic weight coinage to circulate alongside the cistophoric coinage which entered circulation ca. 180 BC.