[ancients] A lovely Alexandrian rendering of Tyche

Through individual purchases and fortunate finds in mixed lots, I'm starting to accumulate some nice provincials of Alexandria. Buying Emmett's book has furthered my interest.

Here's a particularly nice Claudius II/Tyche from the "TIF's Folly" Stack's mixed lot (Doug... I no longer have any gripes about the contents of that lot and regret having initially expressed negativity )



EGYPT, Alexandria. Claudius II Gothicus
year 3, 269/70 AD
tetradrachm, 20 mm, 10.2 gm
Obv: AVTKKΛAVΔIOCCEB; laureate head right
Rev: Tyche standing left with rudder and cornucopia; L Γ in left field
Ref: Emmett 3896 (3), R4

The legend caused some consternation because the Ks look like Ns. The rest of the readable portions of the legends (plus reverse type and year) confirm Claudius II.

In a previous post I commented that the artistry declined over the years. I was wrong. The earliest years of Roman Alexandrian coinage have more of a cartoonish and crude look, like a felt-tipped marker drawing. The silver content of the tetradrachms suffered after those earliest emperors but the artistry is often better. While not the fine style of certain Greek coins, they are nonetheless charming.

Tyche's depiction on this coin is beautiful. Look at her graceful pose! The detailed draping! The cornucopia's contents! I am so happy with this coin.

I have a few more pictures of Alexandrians to take and load but that portion of my website/showcase is coming along nicely. Here's the provincial page with 13 Alexandrians (5 more to load).

Now that I've put the book to use in attributing and checking attributions of my coins, I have nothing to add to vlaha's review except praise. I don't mind the lack of focus on the obverses-- I often buy these (and other Romans) for the interesting reverses rather than the portrait. His numbering system is very nice; just a straightforward progression from 1 to 4681, Augustus to Domitius Domitianus followed by anonymous coins, lead tokens, and glass tokens. Other helpful features of the book:

• Want to find all issuers of a particular reverse? There's an index for that.
• Wish you could look at a list of obverse inscriptions by emperor? Check.
• Wondering what those obverse abbreviations mean? Included in the Obverse Coin Inscriptions list.
• Want to find the corresponding number in other reference books? There's an index for that.
• Need a list of reverse inscriptions? Check. (It's a short list because most don't have a reverse inscription, just a date)

 

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Beautiful coin TIF, the details are stunning!

 

Interesting read and something to think about for awhile. Is that coin a new purchase? I'm confused.

 

Wow! Phenomenal coin TIF! The detail and style of the portrait are fantastic and l really like the patina as well.

 

Gil,

It was one of ~90 coins in a mixed lot-- a blind purchase from a Stack's Bowers auction November 2013. There were a dozen Alexandrian tetradrachms in the lot. The lot description was minimal, there was no picture, and I didn't inspect the lot in person. Blind buying of mixed lots is as close as I can get to digging up my own treasures.* It's a thrill. Often the coins arrive without any identification. Digging for attributions is fun and I learn quite a bit during the process.

*Purchasing uncleaned coins is another way to experience a similar thrill. I tried that a few times but became disenchanted with the poor condition of most of them and with accumulating so many common LRBs.

 

Nice. Do you have a photo of the lot as it arrived to you?

Yeah, lots can be fun. I purchased a couple lots before. A few coins were really challenging. Some I never figured out to this day yet.

 

I wish I had done that but no, I don't have an arrival picture. They were in individual flips, paper envelopes, and 2x2s, all in a long black slab-sized box. Some were attributed, some had no information. Many of the attributions were wrong or incomplete. They appear to be amassed from many different collectors and sources.

There are some individual and group shot pictures of coins from this lot in the following threads:

http://www.cointalk.com/threads/ancients-a-disappointing-mixed-lot.239108/
http://www.cointalk.com/threads/ancients-more-from-tifs-folly-mixed-lot.239343/
http://www.cointalk.com/threads/ancients-the-rest-of-the-lrbs-from-tifs-folly.239412/
http://www.cointalk.com/threads/ancients-a-dozen-alexandrian-potin-tets.239260/#post-1822905
plus several more posts of individual coins

 

Very nice lot of coins. I enjoyed looking at all of them. I think it's fun attributing coins so I don't mind when they are wrong from dealers and other collectors. In fact when I started collecting, it has been suggested to always check others work.

That's what's great about that lot, it will fill many slots in your collection, I'd imagine.

 

Very nice TIF. I've never been a big fan of the portraits on these Tets, but this one is very nice and the reverse is very well detailed.

 

It's a beautiful coin, TIF! I've read that higher-grade tets can exhibit tooling as often as higher-grade sestertii, however. I don't know how true that is, and I know you didn't have a chance to preview the coin, but I wonder if any of the tet experts have anything to say on the matter.

I've come close to purchasing some very sharp tets, but I wasn't certain that the surfaces hadn't been altered.

BTW, it doesn't look like your coin has been tooled - I'm just putting the discussion on the table.

 

I haven't noticed many tooled Alexandrian coins in my browsing. It seems to be a much less frequent occurrence that with Imperial bronzes. Of mine, the Severina year 7 show signs of aggressive cleaning/scraping but given the linearity it is clearly not with the intention of re-carving the devices. http://inaruvi.wix.com/tifcollection#!egypt-alexandria--severina-yr7/cxi3

 

That's a lovely piece though - I think the cleaning was nicely done.

 

Heyyyy, you say that like it's a bad thing. Some of us are actually partial to felt tip marker art.

I've always liked this one particular, but I guess this explains why I prefer the earlier Alexandrian coins?
http://worriedshoes.myshopify.com/products/daniel-johnston-baby-we-were-born-to-run

I do have to agree that Tyche on your coin has exceptional style. Nice one!

 

Ah yes, the fascinating Daniel Johnston. His Jeremiah the Frog mural was part of my neighborhood scenery for many years.

 

I have the same design, but lovingly hand stitched on my apron.



I think the Nabataens may have approved of the style?

 

HAH! It's a small small world, Z

 

I like to think of it as big and small at the same time

 

That's a very slick new addition, Princess ... congrats

... when I get home later, I'm probably gonna post a couple of similar types (not as nice as your new sweetie, but along the same line as your OP coin)

Have a nice day (sadly, I don't have any 'Jeremiah the Frog' examples to add to this cool thread of yours)

 

Unlikely. The curious and frustrating thing about Nabataean coinage is that much of it is exquisitely engraved but sloppily minted. If the coins had been strongly struck on larger, well-trimmed flans, Nabataeans would easily stand up to the best LRB's. But alas, they were not.

 

Great details, color awesome what more could one want, very niceTIF...