3/9/2023 0 Comments The iron money of sparta![]() They were struck while Sparta was a reluctant member of the Achaean League and were made in small quantities using dies engraved in fine style. The earliest of these small silver issues were hemidrachms dated to circa 175 to the 140s(?) B.C. The former shows the head of the god Zeus and the monogram of the Achaean League (a political confederacy in the Peloponnesus) and the latter bears the head of Heracles and an amphora (a transport container) flanked by the caps of the Dioscuri. ![]() They were struck in two denominations: hemidrachms (half-drachms) and triobols (three obols). Later in Spartan history, after the tetradrachm denomination had been abandoned, the Spartans began to issue small silver coins that typically weighed about 2.2 to 2.5 grams. However, Nabis also issued some very rare tetradrachms that paired the head of the goddess Athena with the seated figure of the hero Heracles. Both struck issues bearing their portraits, with examples of the former being very rare and the latter being known by just one example. Just two other Spartan kings issued silver tetradrachms: Cleomenes III (235 to 221 B.C.) and Nabis (207 to 192 B.C.). Whatever the circumstances that caused Sparta to issue its first coins, it occurred at a time when Sparta’s power had been greatly weakened by the rise of kingdoms throughout the Greek world. As such, they likely were produced for the Chremonidean War (267 to 261 B.C.), during which Sparta joined other Greeks in opposition to the Kingdom of Macedon. They were issued at the end of the reign of the Spartan King Areus I (309 to 265 B.C.), or very soon afterward. Even then, the first Spartan coins, comprised of silver tetradrachms and obols, were struck in very small quantities.
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