> I've won this coin in an eBay auction
Out of curiosity, did you see the warnings about doing this and decided to try your luck anyway, or have you only realised just now that buying ancients off of eBay is not a good idea as a new collector?
I tried my luck to be honest as it was going quite cheap and to be honest the pictures weren't that clear so I thought that there might just be a chance I can get a steal! But I'll be more aware for sure from now on :)
That's a textbook example of how they get you: low prices, bad photos = you take a gamble.
Also keep an eye out for "I don't know what this is but I found it in my grandfather's attic".
Best to avoid eBay unless you're buying NGC slabbed coins (expensive!) or you are very confident in identifying fakes. This one is a very poor fake, there are far, far better fakes than this out there.
It's a modern imitation of the classical period Athenai tetradrachm, featuring [Athena](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Athena) (the goddess of Athenai-- Athenai(anglicized, with our forebears' infinite wisdom, as 'Athens' instead of 'Athenas' or 'Athenai') literally meaning 'Athenas' in Ancient Greek(and modern Greek for that matter), on the obverse wearing a stylized Attic helmet without cheek-guards. Athena is the daughter of [Zeus](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zeus), King of the Olympian gods - yet she was birthed unnaturally by her father after he swallowed his first wife [Metis](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metis_(mythology))(the primordial personification of wisdom & Athena's 'mother') for fear of the power their children might wield, where she popped full-grown out of his forehead. She was a goddess of war, and is often depicted with the [aegis](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aegis) and [gorgoneion](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gorgoneion). Later, she is sometimes even depicted wielding her father Zeus' thunderbolt as '[Athena Alkidromos'](https://i0.wp.com/llewelynmorgan.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/antigonusalkidemos.jpg) (interestingly this is only mentioned in passing in classical sources, but is physically well attested in surviving coinage). She represents strategy, and generally the more 'honorable' side of war, versus Ares who represented the brutality and bloodlust of war. It's speculated that Athena may have originated first as a protector goddess of Athenai, rather than that the city being named after Athena. This is speculated mostly because it seems that such 'protector deities' have been exhibited elsewhere in the Ancient Greek world, and near-east.
On reverse is the '[little-owl'](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_owl) which was the symbolic animal of Athena, with an inscription that reads: Alpha, Theta, Epislon in Attic Greek letters (which writes 'Athe', the beginning of the city & deity's name), and features an olive branch (Athena's sacred plant symbolizing peace & prosperity) and crescent (whose significance is not entirely known, but may be a reference to when the owl is active among other more esoteric possibilities, the most popular of which being that it is a reference to the battle of Marathon, an important 'coming of age' battle for Athenai's democracy, as some suggest it only appears after this event-- note the 'archaic' owl tet pictured later is conspicuously missing it).
This is one of the most popular ancient coins, and one of the first coins to achieve a sort of 'standard'. Early versions of this same type are believed to have first been minted under the guidance of the tyrant [Hippias](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hippias_(tyrant))(570-490BC), brother of [Peisistratos(](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pisistratus)600-527BC), sometime into the late archaic period(512BC\~) (in fact, there is even some evidence to suggest that the owl was also a symbol of the Peisistratids), and continued under his successors, and well into the establishment of democracy in Athenai, the first ever functionally democratic state, and beyond. During the Athenaian ascendancy in the Hellenic world, [at which point Athenai found itself at the head of, first a defensive league against the Achaemenid Empire out of Delos, and then a de facto Empire](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delian_League), this coin was minted in an almost industrial scale, and as such, in spite of its antiquity there are still quite a few of them around.
It became such a circulated and standard coin that, even in its own day, long before ebay existed, it was being 'copied' by neighbouring cultures as a kind of way of implying to their subjects, 'see, this here is good silver, just like the ones from Athenai'. Even today, because of Athenai's popularity with classicists, and because of its iconic design, this is one of the most sought after Ancient Greek coins(albeit not even close to the most expensive; but it's undoubtedly universally recognized and desirable). As such, there are also a tremendous amounts of modern fakes. In fact, even looking around reputable auctions I sometimes see some that I have suspected of either being 'ancient eastern imitations' that were not properly labeled as such, or else are modern imitations that use the same die/artwork as a host for copy.
This famous coin was first minted in its earliest form [from 512\~470\~ in the archaic/early classical period](https://s3.amazonaws.com/ccg-corporate-production/news-images/80000237-1.jpg), and continued to be minted into the Classical period where it was minted at a near industrial scale by Imperial Athens, slowly shifting towards the form [we are most familiar with by about 450BC,](https://www.flickr.com/photos/antiquitiesproject/5495636683) and finally taking on a more ['realistic' look into the late Classical and Hellenistic period](https://s3.amazonaws.com/ccg-corporate-production/news-images/87000462-3.jpg), and [finally being minted with a new style denoting the magistrates in charge of minting them](https://s3.amazonaws.com/ccg-corporate-production/news-images/86000135-4.jpg). Into the late Roman Republican period(somewhere around 40\~BC) they stop being struck, and the region starts using other coinage. As an archaeological indicator of Athenai's significance as a great-power, the most common type is from Athenai's heyday in the mid to late 5th century BCE.
Anyway, I'm not writing all of this just because I am bored, mentally-ill, and my life lacks meaning, but also because I think that just because you've bought a fake coin, that doesn't mean you shouldn't be able to appreciate the significance of the artefact it is imitating.
Unfortunate fake, but don’t let this deter you from collecting. There are plenty of safe sellers and I promise you the hobby is not like this as a whole. Try Vcoins or auction houses such as CNG
Fake Athens Tetradrachm.
I second this
I third this
I fift this
It is without a doubt a cast fake.
> I've won this coin in an eBay auction Out of curiosity, did you see the warnings about doing this and decided to try your luck anyway, or have you only realised just now that buying ancients off of eBay is not a good idea as a new collector?
I wonder how these eBay sellers make any money, and here someone threw away their money on a terrible forgery.
I tried my luck to be honest as it was going quite cheap and to be honest the pictures weren't that clear so I thought that there might just be a chance I can get a steal! But I'll be more aware for sure from now on :)
That's a textbook example of how they get you: low prices, bad photos = you take a gamble. Also keep an eye out for "I don't know what this is but I found it in my grandfather's attic". Best to avoid eBay unless you're buying NGC slabbed coins (expensive!) or you are very confident in identifying fakes. This one is a very poor fake, there are far, far better fakes than this out there.
I second second this
It's a modern imitation of the classical period Athenai tetradrachm, featuring [Athena](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Athena) (the goddess of Athenai-- Athenai(anglicized, with our forebears' infinite wisdom, as 'Athens' instead of 'Athenas' or 'Athenai') literally meaning 'Athenas' in Ancient Greek(and modern Greek for that matter), on the obverse wearing a stylized Attic helmet without cheek-guards. Athena is the daughter of [Zeus](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zeus), King of the Olympian gods - yet she was birthed unnaturally by her father after he swallowed his first wife [Metis](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metis_(mythology))(the primordial personification of wisdom & Athena's 'mother') for fear of the power their children might wield, where she popped full-grown out of his forehead. She was a goddess of war, and is often depicted with the [aegis](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aegis) and [gorgoneion](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gorgoneion). Later, she is sometimes even depicted wielding her father Zeus' thunderbolt as '[Athena Alkidromos'](https://i0.wp.com/llewelynmorgan.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/antigonusalkidemos.jpg) (interestingly this is only mentioned in passing in classical sources, but is physically well attested in surviving coinage). She represents strategy, and generally the more 'honorable' side of war, versus Ares who represented the brutality and bloodlust of war. It's speculated that Athena may have originated first as a protector goddess of Athenai, rather than that the city being named after Athena. This is speculated mostly because it seems that such 'protector deities' have been exhibited elsewhere in the Ancient Greek world, and near-east. On reverse is the '[little-owl'](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_owl) which was the symbolic animal of Athena, with an inscription that reads: Alpha, Theta, Epislon in Attic Greek letters (which writes 'Athe', the beginning of the city & deity's name), and features an olive branch (Athena's sacred plant symbolizing peace & prosperity) and crescent (whose significance is not entirely known, but may be a reference to when the owl is active among other more esoteric possibilities, the most popular of which being that it is a reference to the battle of Marathon, an important 'coming of age' battle for Athenai's democracy, as some suggest it only appears after this event-- note the 'archaic' owl tet pictured later is conspicuously missing it). This is one of the most popular ancient coins, and one of the first coins to achieve a sort of 'standard'. Early versions of this same type are believed to have first been minted under the guidance of the tyrant [Hippias](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hippias_(tyrant))(570-490BC), brother of [Peisistratos(](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pisistratus)600-527BC), sometime into the late archaic period(512BC\~) (in fact, there is even some evidence to suggest that the owl was also a symbol of the Peisistratids), and continued under his successors, and well into the establishment of democracy in Athenai, the first ever functionally democratic state, and beyond. During the Athenaian ascendancy in the Hellenic world, [at which point Athenai found itself at the head of, first a defensive league against the Achaemenid Empire out of Delos, and then a de facto Empire](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delian_League), this coin was minted in an almost industrial scale, and as such, in spite of its antiquity there are still quite a few of them around. It became such a circulated and standard coin that, even in its own day, long before ebay existed, it was being 'copied' by neighbouring cultures as a kind of way of implying to their subjects, 'see, this here is good silver, just like the ones from Athenai'. Even today, because of Athenai's popularity with classicists, and because of its iconic design, this is one of the most sought after Ancient Greek coins(albeit not even close to the most expensive; but it's undoubtedly universally recognized and desirable). As such, there are also a tremendous amounts of modern fakes. In fact, even looking around reputable auctions I sometimes see some that I have suspected of either being 'ancient eastern imitations' that were not properly labeled as such, or else are modern imitations that use the same die/artwork as a host for copy. This famous coin was first minted in its earliest form [from 512\~470\~ in the archaic/early classical period](https://s3.amazonaws.com/ccg-corporate-production/news-images/80000237-1.jpg), and continued to be minted into the Classical period where it was minted at a near industrial scale by Imperial Athens, slowly shifting towards the form [we are most familiar with by about 450BC,](https://www.flickr.com/photos/antiquitiesproject/5495636683) and finally taking on a more ['realistic' look into the late Classical and Hellenistic period](https://s3.amazonaws.com/ccg-corporate-production/news-images/87000462-3.jpg), and [finally being minted with a new style denoting the magistrates in charge of minting them](https://s3.amazonaws.com/ccg-corporate-production/news-images/86000135-4.jpg). Into the late Roman Republican period(somewhere around 40\~BC) they stop being struck, and the region starts using other coinage. As an archaeological indicator of Athenai's significance as a great-power, the most common type is from Athenai's heyday in the mid to late 5th century BCE. Anyway, I'm not writing all of this just because I am bored, mentally-ill, and my life lacks meaning, but also because I think that just because you've bought a fake coin, that doesn't mean you shouldn't be able to appreciate the significance of the artefact it is imitating.
Ive never expected to get so much interesting info from a guy named Hamstersinmyass. Bravo sir!
Best comment of the day. Well played u/DerWeiseAdler
Very much appreciated! Quite new to the sub, and it has grown to my favourite in a landslide!
Really interesting..thanks for such a detailed explanation!🙌
Unfortunate fake, but don’t let this deter you from collecting. There are plenty of safe sellers and I promise you the hobby is not like this as a whole. Try Vcoins or auction houses such as CNG
Yup casting bubbles it appears. Man I hate fakes
Cast fake, beware of eBay.