(BC 169-150) Laodike - AV Stater

Laodike Epiphanes Philadelphos, wife of Mithradates IV of Pontos, 169-150 BC. AV Stater (8.49g). Diademed and veiled bust of Laodike left / ΒΑΣΙΛΙΣΣΙΣ / ΛΑΟΔΙΚΙΣ / ΕΠΙΦΑΝΟΥΣ ΚΑΙ / ΦΙΛΑΔΕΛΦΟΥ, banded double cornucopiae filled with fruit, six-rayed star above, monogram to right. Unique and unpublished. EF.

This important piece portraits the daughter of Mithradates III of Pontus as a young woman (she is depicted as a more mature woman on Tetradrachms). This Stater has a certain parallel to an also unique Stater of Mithradates IV (see SNG von Aulock 4), which shows the inauguration of the newly wedded brother and sister. The son of Laodike's older brother Pharnakes (successor of Mithradates III), Mithradates V, was too young to succeed his father to the throne. Because of this, Mithradates IV and Laodike, his sister and wife, took over Pontic government around 169 BC. Two more ladies come into question for the portraited woman: the wife of Mithradates V (daughter of Antiochos IV of Syria) and the daughter of Mithradates V of Pontos, who were also called Laodike.