Pyramid Scheme: Collecting Coins of the Ptolemaic Empire By David S. Michaels The Pyramids at Giza were already more than 2,200 years old when the Macedonian king Alexander III, later called the Great, arrived at Memphis in 332 BC. The Egyptian priestly caste promptly switched allegiance from the Persians, the previous occupiers, to their new Macedonian masters, proclaiming them as liberators and Alexander as true heir to the pharaohs of ages past. Alexander proceeded to the sacred site of Siwa in the Libyan desert, where an oracle pronounced him the son of the great god Amun, whom the Greeks likened to Zeus. He took the oracle seriously, as it fit with his notion that he was god-sired, if not divine. As he prepared to move on, Alexander decided to place his mark on Egypt by founding a city at the mouth of the Nile Delta. Allegedly, he traced out the city plan himself. This Alexandreia would soon become one of the world’s great cities, capital to a new era of Egyptian greatness. Accompanying Alexander in this visit was his close friend Ptolemy, an officer in the elite Companion Cavalry. As canny as he was capable, Ptolemy took careful note of Egypt’s enormous assets, including its easy defensibility, the agricultural bounty provided by the Nile’s periodic flooding, and the rich gold mines of Nubia and the eastern deserts. Upon Alexander’s death in 323 BC, Ptolemy sought and was granted the prized satrapy of Egypt. Alone among the Diadochi (“successors”), he was content with this sphere of influence and resisted all temptation to grasp for supremacy over the whole of Alexander’s vast empire. In 306 BC, he assumed the royal title of Basileos (king), making himself heir to three millennia of Egyptian Pharaohs. His male and female descendants would rule Egypt and its provinces for nearly three centuries, until the fall of Kleopatra VII in 30 BC. Figure 1: Ptolemy I Soter, bust in the Louvre.
Rich Legacy The Ptolemaic Empire lasted longer than any other major Hellenistic kingdom and left a rich legacy for future scholars and collectors in the form of an extensive coinage in gold, silver, and bronze. These beautiful coins have been collected and studied for centuries, most notably by Ionnis Svoronos (1863-1922), a Greek archaeologist and numismatist whose 1904 publication Ta Nomismata tou Kratous ton Ptolemaion remains the most extensive scholarly study of the entire series. In recent years his torch has been picked up by Catharine Lorber, whose “Coins of the Ptolemaic Empire” (ANS, 2018) employs the latest scholarship to survey the first four reigns of the dynasty, from Ptolemy I Soter through Ptolemy IV, from 323 BC to 204 BC, often termed the Empire’s Golden Age. This period set the pattern for the entire Ptolemaic pageant in terms of coin design, denominations, and mint designation. These rulers struck truly stunning coins in gold, silver, and bronze, remarkably for their sheer size and weight as well as their highly artistic designs. Collectors of the Ptolemaic series face a few challenges. Gold coins, as might be expected, are usually quite pricey. In contrast, the basic unit of the Ptolemaic economy, the silver tetradrachm, is widely available, usually at comparatively modest price. However, unlike other Hellenistic kingdoms that feature a portrait gallery of rulers, the vast majority of Ptolemaic silver coinage depicts the dynasty’s founder, Ptolemy I Soter (“savior”), with only a relative few special issues portraying the contemporary ruler. Yet this is a highly sophisticated coinage, whose evolving style and vast assortment of mintmarks, symbols, and regnal dates will reward careful scrutiny. Here is a brief rundown of the most important and intriguing Ptolemaic kings and queens, and the coins they created: Ptolemy I as Satrap As Satrap (323-306 BC), Ptolemy’s earliest coinage was modeled on that of Alexander the Great: gold staters of the Athena / Nike type and silver tetradrachms with the familiar portrait of Herakles wearing a lion skin, along with Alexander’s name and royal title. These early silver tetradrachms were on the same Attic standard employed by most mints outside of Macedon proper, with a tetradrachm of approximately17.25 grams. Starting in Memphis, the mint was soon relocated to Alexandreia, with subsidiary mints in the outlying provinces of Cyprus, Kyrenaica, and Phoenicia. Control marks included a ram’s head, symbolic of the god Amun, and a rose. While not particularly rare in today’s market, these Egypt-mint Alexander tetradrachms tend to be struck from beautifully engraved dies and hence fetch a premium price, usually in the low to mid five-figures. 4
