Messenia, Messene
Nero 54-68 CE
AE Hexachalkon 3.53g 18.09mm
Obverse: Turreted bust of Messene
Reverse: Artemis standing facing, head right, holding long spear, hand on low pillar, dog at feet to right
BCD Peloponnesos 761.3; Grandjean 689e; NCP p. 66 No. 3 (P.III)
Ex BCD collection
ex Glen’s Auction 1979
Pausanias said:
And by the said Damophon is the statue of ((Artemis)) which the Messenians call Laphria
NCP elaborates:
A comparison of this figure with that of Artemis Laphria on the coins of Patrae, which reproduces the statue of Menaechmus and Soidas, furnishes sufficient reason for calling this figure also Laphria. It is probably as the pillar indicates, a copy of a statue, therefore of the statue of Damophon. Damophon was doubtless familiar with the earlier statue of Laphria, which in his time stood not at Patrae but at Calydon in Anatolia, not far from Naupactus, where the Messenians were settled before their city was rebuilt by Epaminondas. The chief variety introduced by him on the older type seems to have been to make the goddess grasp a spear instead of placing her hand on her side.