Coin Talk

George McClellan's post inspired me to showcase some pieces issued during the Panic of 1907. The Panic was caused by a number of factors including a significant drop in the stock market, a failed attempt to take over the United Copper Company and the collapse of the Knickerbocker Trust Company in NY. The ripples of these events were felt throughout the country as depositors withdrew cash from the banking system.

The inelasticity in the money supply exacerbated the problem and led directly to the creation of the Federal Reserve System.

To put liquidity in the system local clearing houses, businesses and banks created cash substitutes to act as circulating media. The most common were circulating checks, clearing house certificates and payroll checks.


This first piece is a clearing house check (really a draft) issued through the Milwaukee Clearing House.


This is a Clearing House Certificate from San Francisco. The...

Faustina II wore her hair in more than half a dozen ways and the standard references (RIC, BMCRE, Cohen and Sear) do not typically note variants in hairstyle or assign separate catalog numbers to them. Some catalogs do, however, such as Temeryazev and Makarenko (CRE). That's why it's odd that her denarius with the VENERI AVGVSTAE reverse type is assigned two separate catalog numbers by RIC and Cohen on the basis of hairstyle, whereas CRE makes no such distinction! It's confusing not only to me, but to coin dealers when listing their wares and the curators of such websites as Online Coins of the Roman Empire (OCRE). I found this out while trying to attribute this well-worn denarius.


Faustina II, AD 147-175/6.
Roman AR denarius, 3.14 g, 17.7 mm, 12 h.
Rome, AD 161-176.
Obv: FAVSTINA AVGVSTA, bare-headed and draped bust, right, without wavy forelock.
Rev: VENERI AVGVSTAE, Venus seated left, holding Victory in extended right hand and vertical sceptre in...

Couldn't help but have my appreciation for Arab-Byzantine coins rekindled when I took these two out and put them together. It helps that they are in better condition than most. As with my Khosrau II 12 nummi coin, I find particularly interesting coinage that reflect two fundamentally different cultures, such as with the Arab-Byzantine series.

I'll link to my previous threads for the history, but I will mention that (as with other instances in history), the Muslims that conquered much of the Eastern Roman Empire and the whole of the Sassanian Empire needed to keep the native populations of these areas happy to cement their control. One way they did this was the continuation of the existing coinage styles (but with slight alterations to make them more Arab- and Muslim-friendly). The Romans kept their folles and the Persians kept their drachms (refered to as fals and dirham respectively by the Arabs). This situation lasted until the coinage reform enacted by the Umayyad caliph Abd...

Although it sounds like a band from the 60's or something, the stakes were high when Hadrianus suffered braindamage (or something like that) in 136 AD and decided to adopt Aelius as his heir. This, to the suprise and against the whishes of all those involved. Lucius Aelius Caesar never lived long enough to enjoy the purple though, as he died in 138 AD. Ouch... And this necessitated Hadrian to adopt future emperor Antoninus Pius, who in turn had to adopt Lucius Verus - son of Aelius - and Marcus Aurelius - great-nephew of Hadrian by marriage - as part of the deal. Lucius Verus however was due to the same fate as his father, although he did manage to co-rule with Marcus Aurelius for about 8 years.

With the denarius shown below added to my collection, I managed to complete one of my collecting goals: completing the Nerva-Antonine dynasty in silver. Aelius coins are not that rare, but I had to wait for quite a while to find a specimen that was within my price range and acceptable...

I bought this coin as part of my Nerva-Antonine Dynasty in Imperial Silver sub-collection. It was one of my favorite coins of 2018. I am currently attempting to catch up on research and write ups for this sub-collection because I would like to have a reference thread for each one. As such, I hope you won’t mind me reposting another coin you saw back in 2018.


Roman Empire
Nerva (AD 96-98)
AR Denarius, Rome mint, struck October AD 97
Dia.: 17 mm
Wt.: 3.47 g
Obv.: IMP NERVA CAES AVG P M TR P II COS III PP; Laureate bust right
Rev.: SALVS PVBLICA; Salus, seated left, holding grain ears
Ref.: RIC II 20
Ex Naville Numismatic Live Auction 44 (Nov. 2018)

A Tale of Two Dies
Even a casual inspection of this coin is enough to see that the obverse is in a much better die state than the reverse. The reverse shows signs of reaching the end of its usefulness while the...

Marked another white whale off my list, a Rome-mint Justinian follis. I love anything Italian Byzantine (and western Byzantine in general), and getting an example of this type was a must for me, especially to complement the Justinian Rome half-follis I already have. Folles and half-folles from Rome during the Byzantine era are rare and so do not come up for sale often. By some strange twist of fate, three different Rome folles were put up for sale this past September; two were in a CNG auction, while mine popped up on VCoins shortly after. I was hoping to snag the lesser-condition of the two from CNG, but it proved to be a popular one and the price went past what I was able to shell out for it. Fortunately, a few days later after the auction ended, I found out a new Rome/Ravenna Byzantine coin had been listed on VCoins. It turned out to be a Rome-mint follis! So I wasted no time in jumping on it!

Justinian I, Byzantine Empire
AE follis
Obv: D N IVSTINI-ANVS P...

A new purchase! The coin is easy to attribute because it is dated and was struck with a very limited set of dies. Mine is a double die-match to the RPC example.

Post your coins of Domitian and Domitia, Anazarbus, or whatever you feel is relevant.



Caesarea ad Anazarbus (Greek Ἀναζαρβός, modern Ağaçli) was a city of the ancient province of Cilicia in what is now south-central Turkey. It was originally founded by the Assyrians but was largely abandoned by Roman imperial times. The original native settlement was refounded by the Romans in 19 BC, following a visit by Augustus. The coinage of this city is typically dated relative to the year of its refounding. Among cities in Cilicia, it was second only to Tarsus in population.

The city was home to Oppian (Greek Ὀππιανός), a minor Greco-Roman poet active during the reigns of Marcus Aurelius and Commodus....

Dear Friends of ancíent mythology!

Here is a coin from the time of the Punic Wars:

The Coin:
Magna Graecia, Bruttium, Brettii, AD 214/213-211
AR - Drachm, 21mm, 4.39g, 330°
struck during Hannibal's campaign in southern Italy after the Battle of Cannae
Obv.: Bust of Hera Lakinia, veiled and wearing polos, scepte over l. shoulder, r.:
behind a fly
Rev.: Zeus, nude, stg. l., r. foot set on Ionic capitel, holding sceptre in l. hand; in front
of him eagle flying l., holding wreath in Talons
in r. field BPETTIΩN from top to bottom
Ref.: SNG ANS 26; HN Italy 1970; Scheu 84; Arslan dies 28/33
VF, very attractive style, dark toning

Note:
Interestingly, the identity of both deities depicted is controversially discussed. The preference of Hera Lakinia for the obv. instead of Ceres/Demeter is based on the existence of the temple in her honour and the local mint. The deity on the rev. reminds with its position of the classical iconography of...

Emperor Marcus Aurelius was part of the so called ‘five good emperors’ (Nerva, Trajan, Hadrian, Antoninus Pius, and Marcus Aurelius), or ‘adoptive emperors’ (idem) or ‘the antonines’ (Antoninus Pius, Marcus Aurelius, Lucius Verus and Commodus). The era ended when Marcus Aurelius appointed his son, Commodus, as his heir.

Marcus Aurelius was, together with Lucius Verus, the successor of Antoninus Pius. Under the reign of Antoninus Pius, the Roman Empire experienced its most peaceful and prosporus period in history. By the time Marcus Aurelius was to ascend the throne, he was 40 years old. Marcus Aurelius was to be known as a philosofical and gentle emperor. Despite his charactaristics, it would become his destiny to be consumed with frontier warfare and other devestating occurences such as the outbreak of the plague which was brought back to Roman territory by the army that fought the Parthians.

The denarius shown below is one of the many, many coins struck under Marcus Aurelius...

I've been waiting (not very) patiently for my Halloween presents to myself. And...


Ok, Ok. It's only one present but the spooky little girl says "Theeeeey're here" not "Iiiiit's here".
I purchased this coin, of course, for the Ketos Sea Monster (Latinized as Cetus)!


(Mosaic with a ketos found at Caulonia (Monasterace) in the Casa del Drago, 3rd century BCE)

Fabled as a maiden munching monstrosity slayed in various tales by such all around bad dudes as Herakles and Perseus!!! There is even a constellation named after this ancient beast (I borrowed @TIF's identification as mine was listed by the seller as being unknown and having a horse on the obverse also, her and I have the much more rare right facing version)


CARIA, Halikarnassos (reassigned from Kindya)
500-496 BCE...