The numismatic chronicle and journal of the Royal Numismatic Society

PERIOD II. CIRC. B.C. 550 180.
During the half century or thereabouts which preceded
the Persian invasion, Boeotia, if we may judge from its
coinage, must have made a mercial activity. Now for
great
the first
advance
time the
in com-
stater or
didrachm makes its appearance, and the incuse reverse
becomes more symmetrical, the alternate incuse triangles
assuming the form of a conventional device which has
been compared to the sails of a wind-mill.
The mint-mark also now takes up a more conspicuous
position, being placed generally in the centre of the
reverse instead of being half hidden in the narrow open-
ings of the shield on the obverse.
The obols have the mint letter prominently placed in the
centre of an incuse square. Of this type coins are known
of the following towns.
(i.) ACRJEPHIUM, a town on the eastern shore of the Lake
Copais, which is said by Pausanias (ix. 23, 3) to have be-
longed from the earliest times to Thebes. It would seem,
however, that before the Persian wars, and indeed down to
about the middle of the fifth century, it must have
enjoyed at any rate certain intervals of autonomy. The
coins of Acrsephium, B.C. 550 480 are :
Stater.
192 grs.
Boeotian shield. in the centre of mill-sail,
mcusc.
[Paris. Xroii. Zdt. ix. Taf. i. 85.]