Extremely Rare Centaur Coin, C. 500-450 BC
Valued at $180,000, this electrum stater was minted by the Orrescii, an ancient Thraco-Macedonian tribe. It shows a centaur carrying off a struggling nymph. The reverse side is a simple quadripartite incuse square. This stater is of the greatest numismatic importance and rarity and is apparently unique and unrecorded. It appears to be lacking a direct comparison in the published numismatic literature. The closest parallel is an electrum stater in the British Museum collection, of similar type, but of a wholly different style and execution.
The Orrescii lived around the ancient city of Lete (map) in Mygdonia, Macedon. They may have been identical to the Satrae and closely connected with the Bessi, or priests of the oracular temple of the Thracian Bacchus. The Orrescii and other Pangaean tribes were miners who worked the mines around the Pangaean range.
Their coins reflected their religious beliefs, the subjects being satyrs and centaurs carrying off struggling nymphs, iconography associated with the worship of Bacchus. The image of a centaur on the Orrescii coins however is more rare than that of the satyr. These coins illustrate the wild rituals which were held in the mountains of Thrace and Phrygia in honor of Bacchus, whose mysterious oracular temple stood on the top of Mount Pangaeum.