The numismatic chronicle and journal of the Royal Numismatic Society

SOME CYPRIOTE "ALEXANDERS". 295
gold stater of an average weight of 8-60 grammes,
obverse : Head of Athene in crested Corinthian helmet
adorned with snake or griffin ; reverse : Winged Nike
standing or advancing to the left holding wreath in
outstretched right, and standard in left ; the silver
tetradrachm and drachm of Attic weight, obverse:
Head of youthful Herakles to right ; reverse : Zeus
aetophor enthroned to left ; lastly bronze coins,
obverse : Head of Herakles as on the silver ; reverse :
Bow in case and club. All the above were inscribed
AAEZANAPoY. At times multiples and divisions of
these principal denominations were struck, such as the
double and the half stater, the dekadrachm and the
didrachm, the triobol, diobol, obol, and hemiobol.
For the eastern portion of the Empire these odd pieces
generally have the same types as the principal denominations.
Such was the first truly national coinage
of the Greeks, destined to take the place, as a world
currency, of the Persian darics and Athenian tetradrachms.
The new coinage was soon being struck in
various mints of Hellas, Macedonia, Thrace, Asia Minor,
Phoenicia, Babylonia, and Egypt.
To the above-mentioned districts, whence Alexander's
coinage was issued, must now be added Cyprus.
G. F. Hill, in his catalogue of the Cypriote coins in
the British Museum, publishes
an Alexander tetra-
drachm 1 of the Paphos mint, and several bronze
pieces 2 of the same ruler from the Salamis mint.
Their attribution is certain, as the silver coin bears
as mint mark a flying dove and some letters of the
1
G. F. Hill, Catalogue of the Greek Coins in the British Musenm,
[Cyprus, p. 45, Nos. 50-1, PI. viii. 12, 13.
2
Hill, loc. cit., p. 65, Nos. 86-9, PI. xii. 20-3.