Catalogue information

LastDodo number
5738619
Area
Coins
Title
Phoenician (War Galley) AE14 4th Century BC
Country
Face value
Year
-350
Variety / overstrike
Head of State
Type
Designer
Series
Theme
Material
Weight
2.1
Diameter
14
Thickness
Punch
Shape
Obverse
Reverse
Edge
Privy mark
Mint mark
Number produced
Krause and Mishler number
Catalogue number
unknown (Sidon, Arados, ?)
Details
OBV; War galley travelling left over two lines of waves, III III III (=regnal year 9) above. REV; Standing deity (Nike, Tyche, etc.) Phoenicia was an ancient Semitic civilization situated on the western, coastal part of the Fertile Crescent and centered on the coastline of modern Syria and Lebanon. All major Phoenician cities were on the coastline of the Mediterranean, some colonies reaching the Western Mediterranean. It was an enterprising maritime trading culture that spread across the Mediterranean from 3200 BC to 300 BC. The Phoenicians used the galley, a man-powered sailing vessel, and are credited with the invention of the bireme. They were famed in Classical Greece and Rome as 'traders in purple', referring to their monopoly on the precious purple dye of the murex snail, used, among other things, for royal clothing, and for the spread of their alphabets, from which almost all modern phonetic alphabets are derived.