TARENTUM SILVER STATER – ISSUE OF MAGISTRATE PHILISCUS WITH TRIPOD SYMBOL EX SALTON COLLECTION – VF NGC GRADED GREEK CALABRIA COIN (Inv. 18493)

$750.00

FPL V, 2 (18493). CALABRIA. TARENTUM. Ca. 281-240 BC.
Silver didrachm (nomos), 6.36 g, 21 mm. Issue of magistrate Philiscus.
Obv. Youthful rider right, crowning his horse, ΦΙΛICKOC below. Rev. TAPAΣ, dolphin rider left, holding cantharus, tripod below.
HGC 1, 891; Vlasto 888; HN Italy 1036.
Ex Salton Collection, likely acquired in the 1950s-1960s when Mr. Salton owned a numismatic firm in New York.
NGC graded VF, Strike 4/5, Surface 3/5, “graffito” noted (letter A on reverse), dark gray cabinet patina.

The reverse type has been variously described as representing Taras, the son of Poseidon and eponymous founder of Tarentum, or Phalanthos, the semi-legendary leader of the group of Spartan colonists that set out to settle at Tarentum in ca. 708 BC. The colonists had been instructed by the Delphic Oracle to establish a new city in southern Italy, but Phalanthos was shipwrecked on the way. Not wishing his oracle’s prophecy to be shown as false, the god Apollo sent a dolphin to save Phalanthos from drowning and to lead the colonists to the site of the new settlement.