I have an antoninianus of Gordian III with an obverse legend that should probably read IMP GORDIANVS PIVS FEL AVG but actually reads FHL rather than FEL. Many Greek legends represent E with an H, but I can't find any other examples of a Gordian ant that does this. Is this very common? Does anyone have any other examples? I just received this coin, so I don't have a photo yet, but I can take one and add it to this thread if this seems unusual. The reverse is VIRTVTI AVGVSTI, and depicts Hercules leaning on a club.
Two possible explanations: It's an E that simply looks odd. Greek-speaking die engraver who made a mistake because he was hooked on (Greek) phonics.
I will be interested to see it and would like to know which it is. By the time of Gordian, coin production had reached a level that many dies were used for each type. I do not know how many. So many individually cut dies makes errors likely and the fact that the error occurred on a letter a Greek speaker might confuse makes this a good guess. There are many other examples of this on coins but I have not seen this one. I wonder if there is anyone who goes out of the way to collect such items or if, like with me, most just consider them oddities. Normal:
Interesting conundrum. I hope you post a photo of the coin. I read somewhere in a scholarly article that many of the mint workers and artisans were Greek, so that may be the explanation.
A Greek-speaking engraver was my first guess, too. Here's a quick-and-dirty image of the coin. I'm guessing it's probably RIC 95, attributed to the Rome mint and here's a close-up of the inscription, rotated 90 degrees counterclockwise, showing the letters . . . S F[H?]L A . . . Are the serifs usually this pronounced on Rome mint Gordians?
