Two Aes of Ancient Spain: Castulo, Colonia Celsa

I received a couple of coins from a Spanish metal detectorist recently. The first is an AE27 of Castulo. The name of the tribe in this region was Oretans. According to tradition, a local princess named Himilce married Hannibal, securing Castulo's support and protection from the Carthaginians.

"In 213 BC, Castulo was the site of Hasdrubal Barca's crushing victory over the Roman army with a force of roughly 40,000 Carthaginian troops plus local Iberian mercenaries. Thereafter the Romans made a pact with the residents of the city — who then betrayed the Carthaginians — and the city became a foederati (ally) of Rome." -wiki

This is great example of these types, with a characteristic Celtiberian bust and the unique reverse that my wife calls the Homer Simpson Sphinx.



Castulo, Hispania Ulterior, c. 165 - 80 BC
AE27, 14.2g; Castulo mint.
Obv.: Diademed male head right; hand to right.
Rev.: Helmeted sphinx walking right, star before; KASTILO in Iberic script below exergual line.
Reference: SNG BM Spain 1323-37.

I have another coin from the same source, which I'll post later, a large bronze of Colonia Celsa, Augustus.

 

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Nice => Great coin, JA ... ahaha, I like the Homer sphinx (good one)

yah, I love the looks of these cool Spanish examples!

=> oh, I have one of these sweet examples too ...



Oh, and the sweet seller gave me this second coin as a "freebie" (man, I love when sellers do that => smart, because I've bought more from him since that kind gesture)



=> sure, it's not a gem ... but it's free and it's cool (it is supposed to be a bull reverse ... if I squint I can see it!!)

 

The second coin is considerably more scarce, of Colonia Celsa during the reign of Augustus. I'm not certain about the dating on these issues. I have attributed it to his earlier tenure as Octavian, as some, presumably later emissions read AVGVSTVS. This one does not. Is it an Imperial or Imperatorial coin? Or would you call it Roman Republic Provincial? Somebody help me out.

The wiki blurb on Celsa is succinct and accurate...

Marcus Emilius Lepidus, governor of Nearer Spain, decided to found a colony here in 44 BC, as Colonia Celsa Lepida, the highest rank of Roman city and, with Caesaraugusta, one of the only two colonies in Aragon. The new town occupied an area of about 44 acres and played a key role as communications centre via Tarraco (Tarragona). The colony numbered 4,000 discharged veterans of the legions, who received a plot of land to cultivate and Roman citizenship.

The settlement was soon renamed Colonia Victrix Iulia Celsa, Latinising its original name, because Lepidus was removed from political office and exiled in 36 BC by Augustus, Caesar's successor. Celsa experienced a period of great splendour, but it was brief and from the time of Nero it began to wane. The reason for its decline is likely to be due to economic and administrative changes resulting from the creation of a new and thriving colony in the area, Caesaraugusta, which monopolised the main trade flows.



Octavian, 27 BC - AD 14
AE32, 16g, 6h; Colonia Celsa.
Obv.: II VIR COL V I CELSA; bare head of Octavian right.
Rev.: Bull right; L.POMPE.BVCCO above, L.CORNE.FRONT (moneyers).
Reference: RPC 269; Burgos 611.

 

Love them both, but the first is my fav. I have similar coin, but what is it about this reverse that makes it unique from other Sphinx reverses?

 

Style - when you see a Celtiberian sphinx, you can't mistake it for anything else. They remind me of Dr. Seuss animals.

 

They do seem to come in several styles besides the Simpsons model. Mine has a much shorter head more like Steve's. None of us have a good hand. I have no legend but my weak strike retained the tapered edge shape of the blank which I considered interesting. They are interesting coins.

 

Very nice, JA!

 

Very cool and interesting coins!!! I LOVE that sphinx!!!!

It's obvious why they are CELTiberian---the Celtic style certainly stands out and that culture was once incredibly widespread.


EDIT: BTW @steve6, when I squint, I DO SEE that bull LOL

 

very nice indeed, i love the style of the spanish coins. i have one of the sphinx coins, but it's kind of a turd....i'd go for a sweet upgrade for sure.


the augustus bull is great as well, i think i like it even more. i dig the style of these spanish coins, they're pretty easy to spot aren't they?

here's my favorite roman-iberian-provincial-rebulican, obuclo, 2nd century BC.

 

Sweeet => wow, that's a nice second bull-coin, JA (man, it is quite a bit better than my seller's kind gesture example!) ... the bull may be more rare, but it's hard not to like the sphinx better, just because ... well, just because it's a super cool sphinx!!

... but oh, I totally agree with Doug that it would be nice if at least one of our cool coins had the "hand" as well as having a cool sphinx (when I bought my example, there were two target-coins and I chased the stronger sphinx image rather than going for a slightly weaker sphinx and a strong hand ... looking-back, I may have gone for column-B? ... who knew, eh?)

Oh sorry, JA => nice-nice-nice => I love both of your sweet new Castulo OP-coins (they are a very neat coin-type)

 

Well, if you don't get all the details you want from one example, you just buy another one. Simple.

 

my wife hates you

 

Ditto

 

hahhaha John, I had many of these......I had 200 As coins from Spain all different, sold them all to numanistic stores in the USA. I have some left..somewhere.....will make pictures later..

 

by the way still regret to have sold them...I can never replace them...:-((

 

I like the Augustus bull better. Great additions!

 

Hello, Found A bilbilis As in a corner...and I got a bronze votife head, that how they have looked, with the curly hair those Iberians...

 

Since the word 'bull' came up a couple times, let me mention that there are a lot of Castulo bull coins out there, too. Like is too often the case, I felt the need to have two of the same basic coin because each had something the other lacked. I would like legend on a coin no worse than the green one but the red colored one was just too pretty to pass up. I can not explain the great difference in style between these two coins.

 

Very nice cyrrhus.