Alexander the Great tetradrachm, no mintmarks

[Skolot]

Greetings ! Please help me to identify this tetradrachm. It has no mintmarks and symbols, so where and when was it struck ?

[Callimachus]

Weight, and especially diameter, are important for attributing Alexander tetradrachms.

That is because the early ones are on thick flans of about 26 mm diameter. Gradually over the next 150 years the flans gradually got thinner and more spread out. I have some that are 34 mm and 37 mm in diameter.

So that information could be of help in attributing this coin.

[Altamura]

The style of the Herakles is very similar to the posthumous Pamphylian Alexanders:

https://preview.tinyurl.com/vpcrndb

But the latter don't have the ΒΑΣΙΛΕΩΣ on the reverse and don't have a back rest at Zeus' throne.
So I have no further idea  .

Regards

Altamura

[djmacdo]

There is an unusually smooth area in front of Zeus's legs.  Perhaps a symbol was removed from the die there--or even the coin.  Does the coin show any signs of having once been in jewelry, such as marks on the edge?

[Skolot]

The weight is 17 grams, diameter is 31-32 mm
I don't see any evident marks on the edge.
The field before Zeus' legs seem to have slight curves.

I made a video, maybe it will be more informative:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9l7KAulhgKo

[djmacdo]

Thank you--the angled photos make what seemed to be a smoothed spot before Zeus' legs look normal, so I dismiss my suspicions.  The coin is mystery--obvious posthumous and it ought have symbols.  Perhaps it was a die trial, struck before the symbols were added.  That is a stretch to believe, but I have no better explanation.

[djmacdo]

Maybe you can find the obverse die--do you access to Price.  I cannot use my library right now--it is being redone.

[Akropolis]

I think I see a part of a mint mark to the left of the 
PeteB

[djmacdo]

I see what you mean, but I cannot make it out,  Perhaps this is just an example of a filled die.

[Callimachus]

In the various indices in vol. 2 of his book The Coinage in the Name of Alexander the Great . . . , Martin J. Price lists 10 coins that have no symbols or monograms on them:

Pella 217
other uncertain mints in Greece 844
Odessus 1132A (not pictured)
Sinope? 1275A (not pictured)
other uncertain Black Sea mint 1321 (not pictured)
Pergamum 1473
Pamphylia 2982 (not pictured)
Tarsus 2999 (not pictured)
Cyrene 3985 (not pictured)
other uncertain mints in the East 4004 (not pictured)

In the coin listings in vol 1, only two of the above-listed coins have the Greek word ΒΑΣΙΛΕΩΣ on them:

Sinope? 1275A (not pictured),  issued c. 275 BC.
other uncertain Black Sea mint 1321 (not pictured), issued c. 250-200 BC.

From the size of the flan of your coin, it could be either of these, although I'd suggest a date closer to 200 BC than 275 BC.

Many (but not all) of Price's mint attributions are "educated guesses" -- and he says as much in the text of the introductions to many of the mints he lists. That would probably also apply to any more recent attributions that may have been done on the mints of these coins.

We may have to accept the fact that over 2000 years later, we may never know the exact places that minted coins in the name of Alexander.

[Skolot]

Thank you all for an interesting discussion !
Callimachus, special thanks for references !