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another difficult ancient coin to identify

Started by alexcoins, May 14, 2024, 11:51:27 AM

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alexcoins

Bronze Weight  g.6,45  Diameter mm.21

Thanks

Sandro

THCoins

The little guy makes me think of a deity called Bes.

JMP

Hey THCoins, rasorsharp today huh  :o !?
Bes indeed! And we have to be in ancient Ibiza.
Back in a minute, unless you are quicker than I am.

JMP

Here . . .

THCoins

Often i lack the time to thoroughly look up a coin.
But we are a good team. I'll give the pass, knowing you are ready for scoring  ;) .

JMP

Well . . . I asked: sharp today ? I had better asked: sharp as allways ?
Till we meet again on screen  ;) !

JMP

The reverse in Punic script says (rigth to left):
"ybshm" for Ibiza and
"50" or 20, 20, 10 for the value of the coin.

alexcoins


JMP

This coin, which is of the kind a forum gets rarely on screen, deserves more than a bare identification.
Let us start with this:
(The bold type is Wikipedia, te normal type is my own comment).

JMP

ON THE COIN ITSELF:

Of course, when I mentioned here that the legend on the pieces reverse was 'IBSHM and 50 it was copy/paste info from other numismatic sites which had such a coin for sale.

But the script was tantalising me and I had to know for sure if that info is correct.

So, to start with: which script do we see on the coin?
Certainly not the Phoenician: 𐤀𐤉𐤁𐤔𐤌, ʾybšm of the Wikipedia text here above.

And Punic was a monumental script. But Neo-Punic was a cursive script and our coin was struck during the period this script was in use. So, let's verify:

Neo-Punic gives us cleanly ' Y B SH M (= Ibiza) as result, starting with the mute letter ':

JMP

Good so far!
But what about the numerals ? The 50 ? The 20, 20, 10 ? Where to find thém ?
Certainly not in the Punic alphabet, as the www tells us in the overview here above.

Maybe on Ibiza they used Punic letters and Phoenician numerals ?
Bingo! That was it:

THCoins