45 minutes of googling brought me to the conclusion that this coin is a Gallenius radiate head obverse with Salus standing right, feeding a serpent reverse. I found a site that said potential RIC274k, C932. I'm close but struggling. Who can get me closer and teach me how to narrow it down? All photos are of the same coin. Sorry, my room lighting is poor. Thank you for the help!
wildwinds.... Gallienus, AE antoninianus, Rome mint. Sole reign. AD 265-267. GALLIENVS AVG, radiate head right / SALVS AVG, Salus standing right feeding serpent in arms. XII in right field. RIC 274a var (fieldmark); Cunetio hoard 1303, Minster hoard 61, Kirkby hoard 17, Göbl 0653a, Sear 10348.
That was fast! Did you go to wild winds and type in Gallenius and start scrolling? I assume this is a very common coin based on hoard findings?
The Cunetio Hoard, which that Wildwinds entry refers to, had 15 specimens of this type, and the Normanby Hoard had 13 specimens. Given that these two hoards together had something on the order of 15,000 or more coins of Gallienus, some types represented by over two hundred examples, yours is not exactly one of the most common ones. But, before you say the Cunetio Hoard had "only 15 examples" of your coin, bear in mind that many other types were represented by only ONE example. Here's a coin of mine from the Normanby Hoard, where it was the only example of its type. In the Cunetio Hoard, the type is also represented by a single example. I could say this one is very rare based on hoard findings, but I do prefer another saying we have in ancients, which is that there's nothing more common than a rare coin. GALLIENUS Billon Antoninianus. 3.33g, 19.2mm. Mediolanum (Milan) mint, 2nd officina, issue 7, AD 266. MIR 36, – [1353f]; RIC V (sole reign) 482; Cunetio 1745; Normanby 474 (this coin, illustrated). O: IMP GALLIENVS P AVG, radiate bust right, with drapery on left shoulder. R: FORT REDVX, Fortuna seated left, holding rudder and cornucopiae; MS in exergue. Ex N. M. McQ. Holmes Collection; ex Normanby Hoard (1985) [IRBCH 854], no. 474
Very cool! After realizing I was misspelling Gallienus, I had a little better luck with wild winds. Is there a database somewhere that details the coins found in all these hoards? I guess I'm trying to get a handle on learning how many examples of a coin are known to exist.
Nope. To begin with, "all these hoards" only represent a fraction of all hoards and single finds ever dug up. Significant reported hoards are likely to be analyzed and published, but not all are. The Cunetio and Normanby hoards are two that are large enough to provide some useful data on the comparative rarity of coins of the period (mid-3rd century AD Roman Imperial and Gallic Empire coins), but comparative rarity is about as good as it gets. If you're interested, the studies on them were recently republished together in a single volume. We had a thread about the book earlier this year: https://www.cointalk.com/threads/cunetio-and-normanby-hoards.331121/ We often see in sale descriptions phrases like "one of three known", "only one in private hands", or even "apparently unique", but those descriptions only apply until another one hundred or one thousand 'new' examples come to light. We've had quite a bit of talk in the past year or two here on CT about the huge hoard of 10,000 (or was 20,000?) Athenian tetradrachms that have flooded the market. Nothing has been published about that hoard, but it's probably doubled the known examples extant of a type that is arguably the most popular and well-known ancient coin we have. I'm still waiting for a hoard of EID MAR denarii to surface.
The point is that the number that exist means absolutely nothing. What counts is how many people want that coin compared to how many coins are available. If someone were to find a bag of 1000, they would not publicise it until they had sold as many as possible with no one knowing about the find. EID MAR coins are pretty well documented so a couple new ones would be noticed quickly. Athenian tets exist in such numbers and from so many dies that it would be easier to make 30,000 find homes. I wonder how many people have purchased a hundred in the last year. What is the current price by the bag? What will they be worth in 50 years? I won't know either answer.
@Seattlite86 -- I find three sites helpful for Gallienus. This one by Marcy Kulick is arranged alphabetically by reverse type. This one by Ed Flynn is arranged numerically by Göbl number. This one by Jim Phelps deals with his "zoo" coins in particular.
Don't know much about foreign coins, but I do collect them. Any time I have had a question, I posted it and found people on this site very helpful. Thanks to all the helpful people on this site that don't make me feel dumb because I don't know something.
