A really interesting series. If you'll forgive me for saying so, it's almost too bad this was done during the Third century rather than the First, due to the relative decline in artistry. Still, they're thematically interesting.
Mea culpa, then, if you took it as a slight. ‘Twas not intended as such. Was merely a random (OK, perhaps not entirely topical) observation on the difference in style between 1st and 3rd century Roman coin engraving. (I have collected the former- not so much the latter.) If you’re a reincarnated (or really, really old) Roman die engraver from the 3rd century and you took offense at that musing, please accept my apologies. I was merely thinking aloud, since I had a little trouble figuring out what some of the animals were. This one in @expat’s post in particular. What is that critter? Obviously I’m not up to speed on the Gallienus “Zoo” series. Guess that shows, huh. They are interesting, as I said. I’ll see myself out now.
Aha, and so I would have. A panther! Looked more like an otter. So I get drubbed for being a mere casual skimmer of this thread and posting offhand commentary without reading closely enough. Guilty. Fair ‘nuf. You’ve rubbed my nose in it, and I suppose I deserved the treatment. I’ll see myself out, now. Again.
Ha! I lied. Here I am again, on your thread. To atone for my faux pas, I just marched myself over to VCoins, browsed a bit, and purchased this coin. See? My first Gallienus “Zoo” coin. Since we’ve already established the fact that I’m an idiot, I’ll just copy and paste the attribution from David Connors. Wouldn’t want to make any other unforced errors! (I had to look up what an “unforced error” is.) I guess there’s nothing wrong with a zoo including mythological beasties, eh? If you’ll pardon yet another random and casual observation. I will put this coin in my future giveaway inventory. (New giveaway here, BTW. If one of you wants a Gallienus centaur, I should have it by the time we do the drawing at the end of the month.)
It seems our author deleted the original post in this thread (needlessly and unfortunately), because he got annoyed with me over some of my admittedly ignorant and cheeky commentary from before. It was really NOT my intention to sabotage this thread. And when I realized my ignorance, I did go and buy one of these coins as a way to learn more (I'm a backwards "buy the coin before the book" kind of guy). Then I came back here to read the thread more carefully than I did the first time, and maybe learn a little, but unfortunately, by that time, @Victor_Clark had deleted the original post. I have tried to use my moderator powers to restore it, but sadly his image attachments were destroyed when he deleted the OP. So anyway, do please ignore my earlier, uninitiated commentary and continue the discussion- either here or in a new thread. I see there is a relevant thread on NumisForums, to which @Victor_Clark also contributed. It references a recent CoinWeek article about Gallienus Zoo coins. Here is Victor Clark's gallery page about them. And here is a YouTube video by Classical Numismatics, which I found educational. Have I learned a tiny bit about Gallienus "Zoo" series since I originally saw this thread? Yes. Just a tiny bit. Am I likely to pursue collecting the series? Doubtful, but I can now see why people find them fascinating. My apologies if my earlier posts distracted from the discussion.
