Kyzikos (BC 600-550) EL Stater

ca 600-550 BC. EL Stater (16.30g). Head of tunny fish left, jaws closed, backbone protruding from truncation at right. Below, tail of tunny fish / Quadripartite incuse square. Apparently unpublished denomination with this type. VF.

The tuna was the sole type on the earliest electrum coinage of Cyzicus, but the relationship between type variety and denomination was inconsistent. In some series a whole tuna indicated a stater and just part of the fish indicated a smaller denomination, but our coin is a stater and shows just the head and the tail of a tuna. In any case all staters of this early period are very rare, and this type seems to be unpublished.