I've been on a bit of a buying spree recently, and here's another cool new pickup: Parthian Kingdom, Ekbatana mint. ?Meherdates (49-50 AD). AR drachm (21.5mm, 3.66g). Obverse: Facing bust wearing cap with ear-flaps and diadem with long end ribbons, star to either side. Reverse: Seated archer and mintmark, seven-line slightly blundered standard Greek legend. Sellwood 67.1, Shore 368. Classical Numismatic Group Esale 403; ex Nisa Collection. This type was recently reassigned from the short-lived and unmemorable Vonones II (51) to the better-documented and more interesting usurper Meherdates (49-50). Meherdates was a grandson of Phraates IV and son of Vonones I, and was living at Rome as a guest/hostage. In the late 40s AD the Parthian king Gotarzes II apparently became paranoid, killing most of his close male relatives and many others who he perceived as a threat. A group of discontented nobles made their way to Rome and pleaded their case directly to Claudius and the Roman Senate, asking for Meherdates to be sent to them as their new king. Claudius complied, and in 49 Meherdates re-entered Parthian territory. However, some of his allies proved to be double agents, as they first delayed his movements long enough to allow Gotarzes to build up his forces, and then withdrew troops from Meherdates' side before the battle. Meherdates was captured alive, and in a rare show of clemency Gotarzes did not kill him, but he did order Meherdates' ears cut off so that he could be ineligible to take the throne. (Many ancient peoples required their kings to be physically perfect in order to reign, thus one way to ensure that a certain man could not become king was to mutilate him. This happened a lot during Byzantine history. Sometimes actual history is just as horrifying as a Game of Thrones episode.) Gotarzes had his victory inscribed in a large rock carving which still survives, but he died in 51 AD of natural causes. This is probably the most common of the Parthian facing bust issues, although even at that it is somewhat scarce. As usual, the motivation for using a facing bust is not clear, but modern collectors are glad that he did.
This is where we should call for our dragon coins but I know better. I might comment that many Parthian coins get reassigned every time someone reworks the chronologies. It bothers me that w rarely see a reason given for the change and just told not to question the expert. I suppose part of this might be that we didn't have coins for Meherdates and needed some. There was a time I really wanted a facing drachm of Vologases V because of his association with Septimius Severus. His are certainly the king of the facing portraits but not something I am likely to own. All I have are a pair of Phraates III (long ago possibly Darius?). I bought the denarius in 1998 from a dealer I coded JCM(CA). I wish I knew who that was now but my code was too cryptic.
This is certainly one of the frustrations associated with collecting Parthians. Attributions can be a moving target. Most of the attribution changes over the past two decades have been posited by Dr. G. R. F. Assar, perhaps the world's foremost authority on Parthian coinage since Sellwood's passing. To be fair, he has published his reasoning for each reassignment, as far as I know. The challenge is that his rationales are buried in multiple articles across different periodicals. Most are available online here: http://parthian-empire.com/articleListPage.php As of a few years back Assar was supposedly going to continue work that Sellwood had been engaged in, toward a 3rd edition of The Coinage of Parthia. It would be nice to have all of the reassignments in one neat package like that. But I have not heard any updates and I suspect that the project is at a halt or cancelled, especially with the Sylloge Nummorum Parthicorum underway.
I just picked up my first Parthian last week, which is a left facing bust, but I really like those facing bust issues and will add to my list of wants.
