A while back I decided that I had to have one of these coins. I was a bit disappointed to lose one during an online auction a couple of weeks ago. I then found this one being offered by one of my favorite dealers at a price close to my top bid during the auction. The first time I saw one of these it was in Kenneth Bressett's beautiful book entitled Money of the Bible, 2nd Edition. I've featured some of his interesting wording as it applies to the Roman victory in the Roman Jewish War.
That is a spectacular specimen DR. I have a fairly poor (but very cheap) specimen, I will try and post it later.
I really love your new coin @Deacon Ray (good style and nicely centred), but must strongly disagree with Mr. Bressetts conjecture about the type! It was struck in 77-78 along with several other pastoral agrarian types. There is even a type showing Mars with a grain ear. Viewed in this context the issue celebrates the empire's agrarian bounty under Vespasian's wise stewardship. The sow with her piglets fits neatly into the series. To see types that truly insulted the Jewish people, one need not look further than the Judaea Capta types. A Jewess with hands bound under a palm tree ... or at the foot of a Roman soldier. The horrifying aspects of those types still speak to us today. The extraordinary claim that the sow and piglets reverse type was the punchline of a cruel Roman joke is tame in comparison.
Sweet coin, as always Deacon Ray! The coin is now on my ever expanding wish list! I was gifted a different edition of the book by one of our fine, generous CoinTalk friends. Erin
Thanks, David! And thank you for the excellent contrasting opinion about the intentions behind the imagery on the coin. I think I'm leaning toward your side on this. If Vespasian had wished to create an insulting coin he would have produced something worse than this—along the lines of the restrained Jewess on the other Capta denarii. The coin is more likely part of the farming series.
Certainly the Roman's thought many aspects of Jewish culture was odd or abnormal and would poke fun at it, but I think those types of jibes would more likely end up on a latrine or brothel wall than on a coin. BTW, nice oxen type!
I think the sow and piglet type also strongly alludes to one of Rome's founding myths. The reverse of this A-Pi as depicts a scene from Virgil's Aeneid. It refers a prophetic dream of Aeneas, an ancestor of Romulus and Remus. While leading a group of refugees who have fled Troy to Italy, he encounters the river god Tiberinus in a dream, who tells him he should settle his people when he sees a white sow suckling her young under an oak tree. He sees this very omen the next day along the river, at a site that would in future become the city of Rome. ANTONINUS PIUS AE As. 11.02g, 28.6mm. Rome mint, AD 140-144. RIC 733; Cohen 450. O: ANTONINVS AVG PIVS P P TR P COS III, laureate head right. R: IMPERATOR II, sow seated by a river under a oak tree suckling three piglets, with another one in front of her; SC in exergue. Ex Old Sable Collection
Yes! That too seems like a possibility. The pig is from Roman folklore. Thank you, @zumbly ! Also, your coin is great. I've never seen one before.
Great denarius! I see that multiple emperors have used pig imagery on their coins. That would support the belief that the pig is not intended to be an insult to people of the Jewish religion.
Recent books that have been discussed in these forums have painted an interesting picture of historical books dealing with coins (as the main subject or in passing) containing some unfortunate errors. I often wonder how much of the "meaning" of certain images on certain coins is hearsay based on the author's personal opinion or the personal opinion of another collector he talked to, or an editor's mistake or bias, instead of historical research.
I would be remiss if I did not mention what Harold Mattingly wrote about the series in BMCRE II - 'The Caesar Vespasianus Aug. issue is taken up with types drawn from country life., Annona with a bundle of corn-ears on her lap, the modius and corn-ears, the sow and young, the goat-herd milking a she-goat. The undated Ceres August., Ceres holding corn-ears, poppy and torch, must be of the same date. We seem to see here the outline of a programme for the restoration of agricultural prosperity in Italy, of which our scanty authorities have left no detailed record.'
