Photography / Greek Numismatics pt8: God Poseidon
God Poseidon, or God of the Seas, was one of the most important gods of ancient mythology and thus it is no wonder he was one of the main artistic themes, whether it involved sculptures or even coins.
The engraver of this 1930 modern Greek coin, tried to replicate a 2300 year old tetradrachm, depicting god Poseidon and did a pretty good job with this. The form of Poseidon is quite iconic and this is what has made this coin a classic for collectors.
The coin was struck on silver (50%), for wide circulation - with a denomination of 20 drachma. However, few good coins remain today, and thus their value is quite high. It's not uncommon for uncirculated coins to be sold in the 200-800$ range and medium quality coins to go around 30-50$.
Photographic settings: Compact Sony DSC-WX220 / ISO 100 / EV -2.0 / Natural Light. The two shots (first and third) are angled towards the light, to increase coin reflectivity.
Copyright notice: I release these in the public domain, for use or edit, by anyone, for any reason, with no attribution required.
Is that God Series @alexgr?
Put up other link as well, Thanks!
If you mean if these are from the Perth mint series with Gods, no. These are casual silver coins that were in circulation around 1930 in Greece. This one was something like the Peace Dollar equivalent for Greece.
I mean are they in a set series?
The latest , god knows how many Gods of Greek out there.
Now, Norse Gods series in 3 oz silver over $300 USD release price.
Don't worry, modern Greeks don't have an obsession with Olympian Gods ahahah... this was indeed on a series (5-10-20 drachma 1930), but only 2 of them had gods on it.
the 5 drachma didn't feature a god, but had the Phoenix (on nickel): https://steemit.com/photography/@alexgr/photography-greek-numismatics-pt1-phoenix-rising-from-its-ashes
the 10 drachma featured Goddess Demetra (on silver 0.500): http://www.ebay.com/itm/like/191991223129? - I won't be featuring that one as it's below the threshold of my aesthetics...
the 20 drachma was Poseidon (on silver 0.500) - which is pictured in this post.
Aside from these, from 1900+, you'll find Gods
a) in the 1912 - 20 lepta (Goddess athena): http://en.numista.com/catalogue/pieces2365.html
b) the 20 lepta / 50lepta / 1 drachma / 2 drachma set of 1926 with Goddess Athena: http://www.ebay.com/itm/Uncirculated-1926-Greece-Complete-Set-Drachmai-Lepta-Goddess-Athena-Head-/321395138495
c) the 1973 - 20 drachma with Goddess Athena: https://steemit.com/photography/@alexgr/photography-greek-numismatics-pt5-goddess-athena
...there might be a few more, in very limited quantities, proofs, collectibles, etc, like this: http://www.ebay.com/itm/GREECE-100-DRACHMAS-1978-SILVER-PROOF-50th-ANNIV-BANK-OF-GREECE-/390571863221?
Or this: http://en.numista.com/catalogue/pieces56315.html
...but generally, they are very few. And not always good looking. I mean the gold piece above on Zeus could be far, far better.
❤️️ this and nominated for @steemplus 👍
Public Domain license, awesome :)
I did this with the entire series, but the Internet will appreciate this coin in particular as there aren't many (or any?) photos with reuse rights for it.