The post-Demareteion tetradrachms are postulated to begin with those issues bearing a sea monster beneath the obverse chariot. B.V. Head, a pioneering researcher in Sicilian numismatics, interprets this device "to symbolize the vanquished naval power of the Tuscans, just as the lion which appears on Gelon's coins after the battle of Himera [the Demareteion dekadrachms] may symbolize the destruction of the African dominion in Sicily." 13. This is a reference to Hieron's victory over the Etruscans at Cumae in 474 which Diodorus records briefly:

And in this year Hieron, the king of the Syracusans, when ambassadors came to him from Cumae in Italy and asked his aid in the war which the Tyrrhenians, who were at that time masters of the sea, were waging against them, he dispatched to their aid a considerable number of triremes. And after the commanders of this fleet had put in at Cumae, joining with the men of that region they fought a naval battle with the Tyrrhenians, and destroying many of their ships and conquering them in a great sea-fight, they humbled the Tyrrhenians and delivered the Cumaeans from their fears, after which they sailed back to Syracuse. 14.

Attributing the Demareteion dekadrachms, and thus the end of the early tetradrachm series, to 479, and the sea-monster tetradrachms to 474, leaves a gap of five years during which the Syracusans supposedly struck no coins. Given that it was during these five years that they were receiving a 2000 talent indemnity from Carthage, and thus would have been able to strike a considerable number of coins, the hypothesis is untenable. 15. Likewise, Head's willingness to interpret the lion on the dekadrachms as a sign of victory at Himera ought to counsel against blind acceptance of his link between the sea monster and victory at Cumae. This exergual device continued for twenty-five years, inviting speculation as to whether the victory was really worthy of such commemoration. 16. Similar long-term remembrance is unknown in any other classical Greek series, and so I argue that it is irrational to support such a theory here. Therefore, the traditional dates of the two cornerstones of established Syracusan chronology, the Demareteion dekadrachms and the sea monster tetradrachms, have been fundamentally challenged.

The Syracusan tetradrachms of the chariot/Arethusa design may be confidently attributed as the imperial coinage of the tyrant, Gelon. He started striking them shortly after he moved his seat of power from Gela to Syracuse in 485 bc. Their production continued into the democratic period following the death of Gelon's brother and successor, Hieron I, in 466. The coins maintained their fabric and general design types throughout this era, but the evolution of small details such as hairstyle, decorative adornment (jewelry and headbands) and exergual devices allows them to be placed in a relative chronology reflecting the transition of Greek art in general, from the Archaic to Classical periods. Two defining moments in fifth-century Syracusan history took place contemporaneously with the striking of these coins: Gelon and Theron of Akragas' crushing defeat of the invading Carthaginian army under Hamilcar at Himera in 480, and the defeat of the Etruscan fleet at Cumae in 474. Traditionally, these events have served as props on which to brace the entire Syracusan numismatic chronology. Reinterpretations of evidence have undercut their support, and so the dating of the Demareteion dekadrachms must be re-established in light of this information.

An attractively daring suggestion theorizes that the literary tradition has correctly identified the Demareteion as a silver dekadrachm (as opposed to a gold piece), but its association with 479 may be erroneous: the result of a linguistic corruption. 17. Gelon was a priest of Demeter; "pertaining to Demeter" in Greek is "Demetreion" or . The name of his wife, Demarete, is rendered as . Given this similarity, it is not inconceivable that Carthage paid a sum of precious metal into the temple of Demeter, or perhaps Gelon issued a coin commemorating the dedication of Demeter's temple following Himera, and the terminology was adulterated over time into the name of the tyrant's wife. Later historians then scrambled to "explain" the issuance of a large coin in the name of Demarete. Numismatically, this hypothesis allows the dekadrachm issue to be pushed later into the 470s, more in keeping with the general Syracusan chronology than is a date of 479.

I argue that the Demareteion dekadrachms were struck at Syracuse during the decade from 475 to 465, perhaps to commemorate a specific event (maybe even the expulsion of the tyrants in 466), but possibly as a general expression of the city's greatness. A massive coin of such exquisite artistic quality is a fitting tribute to the civic pride and identity which citizens of Syracuse must have felt as their city rose to heights rivalling Athens and the other Eastern Greeks. This would necessarily push the sea monster tetradrachms to a later period as well, circa 470-460. The available evidence, however, is sufficient only to debunk existing theories, and not to prove new ones. The beauty of the science of numismatics is its ever-evolving nature. With every furrow of a Sicilian field, and every sweep of a metal-detector, comes the possibility of uncovering new evidence. Until then, the dekadrachms of the Demareteion Master should be appreciated for what they are: the pinnacle of Greek art in coinage.

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