THE COIN COLLECTOR - World eBook Library

GREEK COINS
Ethiopian legends. The metals appear to have been
gold and bronze, both of small module.
Cyrene and its colony, Barce, equally go back,
numisinatically and politically speaking, to the sixth
century b.c. The former, itself a Dorian settlement,
has left us a wealthy assortment of most interesting
regal and other coins in electrum, silver, gold, and
bronze. The electrum was the earliest metal employed,
if the attribution to Cyrene be correct ; but there were
also archaic gold pieces, as indicated by Babelon and
other authorities. A prevailing type on the most
ancient silver monev is the silphium plant, its leaf,
bud, or seed. Certain tetradrachms of thick fabric are
thought to have been struck by Arcesilaus III. in b.c.
530 to pay his Samian and Rhodian auxiliaries, when
he regained power with the aid of Polycrates, tyrant
of Samos. In b.c. 247, Magas, queen of Cyrene,
brought that country in dower to Ptolemy III. of
Egypt. There are later Roman coins. But the first
period was during the republican era, b.c 431-321, to
which we have to refer all the gold and silver pieces
of the best workmanship and of Greek style. At
Barce we also find the silphium type, and money in
gold, silver, and bronze. The money is scarce and
valuable, which may partly proceed from the decline
of the place after the rise of its port Ptolemais under
the Egyptian kings. The three remaining town-
ships in Cyrenaica also issued coins. There is a
tetradrachm of Euesperides at Turin, said to be
unique.
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