Sicily, Selinos AR Tetradrachm. Circa 455-415 BC.
Obv. Artemis driving slow quadriga right, holding reins in both hands, Apollo standing on her right, discharging an arrow; barley grain in exergue.
Rev. River-god Selinos standing left, sacrificing with phiale over flaming altar, holding laurel branch in left hand, cock before altar, bull behind to left, standing on pedestal, surmounted by selinon leaf; ΣΕΛ-ΙΝΟΝΤΙ-ΟΝ around.
Silver, 17.34 g, 26.4 mm. W. Schwabacher, Die Tetradrachmenprägung von Selinunt, MBNG 43, 1925, 18 (Q8/S23); SNG ANS 698; Rizzo 3, pl. XXXIII.
Grane VF-.
Selinos was one of the first Sicilian cities to mint coins, beginning in c. 540-530 BC. Early staters which depicted a large selinon (celery) leaf as the obverse type were eventually replaced by a Syracuse-inspired chariot as in the type depicted , and retain the early emblem of the city on the reverse as an additional symbol. Two subordinate elements of the performance attract attention - a rooster in front of the altar and a bull placed on a platform. A.H. Lloyd (NC 1935) believed that these two symbols represented Selinos's long friendship with Himera, as the rooster was the main symbol of Himera, and he identified the bull as the bronze statue of the bull in which the tyrant of Akragas, Phalaris, supposedly roasted his enemies alive. He based his thesis on the fact that Himera was one of the important acquisitions of Phalaris in his quest to conquer Sicily. Both symbols are reproduced in great detail. The main element of the reverse is the divine personification of the Selinos River, depicted as an idealized naked young man in a laurel wreath, holding a platter and a carefully refined laurel branch. There is no doubt that the author of the coin's dies was one of the best engravers active in Sicily in the middle and at the end of the 5th century.
