Helmets on Ancient Coins

I periodically like to take inventory of my coins that feature helmets.

I have a new one this year — my Seleucid Antiochos VII (top and to the right of the crested helmet) — This awesome coin was given to me by @gsimonel who is my 2021 Secret Saturnalia Santa.

This is a compendium of Indo-Scythian, Judaean, Nabataean (replaced with Indo-Scythian), Seleukid, and Roman coins. Please feel free to post yours.

The Nabataean coins have been replaced with an Indo-Scythian coin.​

 

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@Deacon Ray......Lovely display as always!
Here's my favourite helmet....

Iberia. Indigets. Emporia Æ AS...27.88mm/10.05grams..27-25 BC..
Obverse:Head of the goddess Pallas Athena wearing a Corinthian helmet with the visor raised and a large plume.
Reverse: Pegasos flying right, laurel crown above rump; EMPO below.
Villaronga, ACIP 1098 - R6
Ex Archer M Huntington Collection (HSA 1001.1.10234).

 

Large head small Helmet no coin Prussian Imperial GARDE Helmet, original…..Old overweight German wearing it…

 

Parthians have many helmet portraits.


Meherdates (50 - 49 A.D.)
AR Drachm
O: Bust facing with moustache and very short beard, royal wart on brow, tiara with ear flaps and ornamented with a horn on each side, diadem loop and end extending on each side, flanked by two six-pointed stars.
R: Blundered Greek legend forming square around, archer (Arsakes I) seated right on throne, bow in extended right hand, cross below seat, Ekbatana mint monogram below bow.
2.8g
21mm
Ekbatana mint.
Sunrise 417/418 (Meherdates); Sellwood 67.1 (Vonones II); Shore 368 (Vonones II)


Mithradates III (87 - 80 B.C.)
AR Drachm
O: Diademed bust of king left, wearing tiara decorated with 6 pointed star.
R: ΒΑΣΙΛΕΩΣ ΜΕΓΑΛΟΥ ΑΡ−ΣΑΚΟΥ ΑΥΤΟΚΡΑΤΟΡΟΣ ΦΙΛΟΠΑΤΟΡΟΣ ΕΠΙΦΑΝΟΥΣ ΦΙΛΕΛΛΗΝΟΣ, 7-line legend around archer.
Rhagai mint
3.74g
20mm
Sellwood 31.6 (Orodes I); Sunrise –; Shore 123 (Orodes I)


Pakoros II (77/78 - 105 A.D.)
AR Drachm
O: Diademed bust of Pakoros II left with short beard and wearing a tiara with "hooks”.
R: Archer (Arsaces) seated right on throne, wearing bashlyk and holding bow. 7 line retrograde legend: OΛIIΛEΛC OΛIIΛEΛN ΛPIΛNOV ΔIXΛIOV IVIIΓITO(V) IΠIΦΛNOVC ΦIΛIΛHNOC.
23mm
3.18g
Ecbatana Mint
Sellwood 77.8; Shore 399; Sunrise 434 (Pakoros I); SNP Pacorus II – Type VII

 

Nice Stuff….

 

I love the graphic Ray, but you can't include the Nabataens as examples of helmets. In both cases, the bust of Aretas IV is laureate. The circulation wear flattens out the wreath and makes it look like a helmet. There are no Nabataean types that feature a helmeted king.

 

This is easily my best helmet coin.

Kassander, 305-298 BC. AE
Struck under Pleistarchos 301-298 BCE​

 

I really like it, especially the reverse

 

Roman Gaulic

 

The coin pictured below is one of my favorites .

Maximian Herculius, AD 286-310 (struck AD 305), Aquileia Mint, Officina 1. Billon Nummus: 11.98 gm, 28 mm, 12 h. Reverse: FIDES MILITVM AVGG ET CAESS NN.

I like the helmet on this Constantine I, billon nummus too .

 

Great!

 

Wow that is the Constantine I want

 

A few of my favorite helmets on ancient coins, atop the heads of Athena, Roma, Mars, Arcadius, and Constantinopolis:













My favorite helmet on an ancient artifact, a 60 mm. bronze figurine of Mars Ultor:






My favorite old photo of someone in a helmet: my maternal grandfather in late October 1915 at the age of 20, taken in Cambrai in Northern France. He was in the 6. Infanterie Division, 12. Infanterie Brigade, Infanterie-Regiment
Großherzog Friedrich Franz II von Mecklenburg-Schwerin (4. Brandenburgisches) Nr. 24, and was wounded four months later at Verdun.

 

@DonnaML......Wonderful photo of your Grandfather!...

 

If you look closely and compare to the title photo, you will note the two (not three) attachments that held the crest are on the coins.

 

My Maximianus and Roma in helmets:




Athena in Corinthian helmet, so as her Roman counterpart Minerva.

 

A few helmets I find interesting


Thrace. Mesembria circa 420-320 BC.
Bronze Æ
13 mm, 2,16 g
Crested Corinthian helmet facing / META between four spokes of wheel. SNG BM 272-274; SNG Stancomb 225; Serdica CCCH IX, 14-18; Karayotov II, 47-54; SNG Cop. 653.




Calabria. Tarentum circa 380-325 BC.
Diobol AR
10 mm, 0,90 g
Head of Athena right, wearing crested Attic helmet decorated with hippocamp/ Herakles crouching right, holding club and strangling the Nemean Lion to right. Vlasto 1303–5; HN Italy 911.



Kings of Macedon. Uncertain mint in Macedon. Antigonos II Gonatas 277-239 BC. From the Tareq Hani collection
Bronze Æ
14 mm, 4,54 g
Philip III Arrhidaeus Uncertain mint in Western Asia Minor. (323-317 BCE)/ Or Antigonus Gonatas (288-277 BCE)
Bronze Æ Half-bronze unit, (PB, 16) No. v19-0059
16mm, 12 hours. 4.11g. No. 110 in the reference books: Cop.- - Price 2803 pl. 110
Obverse, Three-quarter-front head (Herakles?) to the right placed in the center of a Macedonian shield.
Reverse, Macedonian helmet; in the field on the right, a caduceus; monogram in the left field.




Aiolis. Myrina circa 400-300 BC. Bronze Æ 10 mm., 0,69 g.
Helmeted head of Athena right
Amphora "MY-PI"
SNG Cop 216-220; SNG Munich 570




Anonymous 217-215 BC. Rome
Quartuncia Æ
16 mm, 2,46 g
Obv: Head of Roma, right, wearing Attic helmet. / Rev: Roma, Prow, right
RRC 38/8

 

On Republican Roman didrachms and later denarii the crest of Roma's helmet always represents a griffin.
Among the bronze material found by the Italo-American team on the site of the Aegates Islands naval battle (241 BC, Rome vs Carthage, decisive victory for Rome), there are bronze rams from the sunken ships, and helmets. One of these has a crest representing a griffin's head :


These helmets are all "Montefiorino type", after specimens found in Celtic graves of Northern Italy. We know that the Romans had adopted for themselves pieces of armament inspired by the Gauls, but also that the Carthaginians had hired many Gallic mercenaries, so we cannot say if this helmet belonged to a warrior fighting on the Roman or Carthaginian side.

 

Yes — — I see what you mean — I mistook a section of the wreath for the crest of an Athena style helmet.

Thanks, John !!!!