I follow as senior free auditor the course on archeology and Celtic art in Belgium The Royal Institute for Archeology and Art. Professor Eugène Warmenbol told us something very interesting, Celtic art even on coins have always at leat 2 interpretations and 2 designs different and it is the same surely for most Celtic coins. So it is quite unique in numismatic as that mean that in a normal way like on photos you have one representation and if with a photo software you trun the coin from 180 degrees you see an other design and both have a message different but for celts a meaning . The Roman had as opinion that celts were too creative and had cultural difficulties to understand how they can communicate so different ideas according to the position of a art piece or a coin. The Roman were logical and traditional in their style. Try to play with you Celtic coins in an other way or pint of view it is fascinating. Eugène Warmenbol is not a numismat but is very interested in Celtic coins and had great talk with JM Doyen.
Celtic coins surely are showing great inventivity, and it is clear that the creators of these types didn't think along the same lines as the Roman or Greek celators. Possibly these coins didn't have the same aim as those everyday payment items - they might be votive objects, things to show off with, religious tokens or badges. We simply don't know. Here are some of my favorites. Bellovaci (South Somme – mid-Vallée de l’Oise). AE "with the lion", class I, c. 75-60 BC. Obv. Curly head. Rev. Branch-maned lion jumps to the left. 16 mm, 2.50 gr. LaTour 8577. Bought at the coin fair in Tienen (Belgium), 2015. AE Carnutes, 1st century BC. Obverse: head to the right with decorative hair. Reverse: a large and a small bird (eagles) with outspread wings are attacking a serpent. Pentagram left, cross or sun in the middle. 17 mm, 2.56 gr. La Tour 6088. Bought at the coin fair in Leuven (Belgium), 2016. A very fascinating, more abstract design: Potin Lingones, 80-50 BC. Obv. Three-lock / triskelion / 3 fish bubble shapes. Rev. 3 thick S-shapes around a center. 18 mm, 2.23 gr. The Lingones tribe was living around what’s now Langres. LaTour 8329. Bought from a German firm on Ebay, 2018.
@oldfinecollector this older thread may be of interest to you: https://www.cointalk.com/threads/viewing-coins-obliquely-3-d-images-on-ancient-coins.349565/
Good to explore that fascinating article again. A coin is more than two flat pictures on a screen or in a book! If you hold it, you turn it to have a better look. Anybody does that. A celator, who is a fine craftsman commanding differences in the tenths of millimeters, might well try to experiment in the dimension between relief and flat. I found the "other way of looking" into the temple of Zeugma a quite strong argument.
Here is a coin that I recently won in a CNG electronic auction, an exquisite work of art I think. This little silver coin is an object you like to touch - that is hollow at the horse side and the head side is convex - you put the reverse on the top of your finger and turn the grey and silver surfaces of the obverse to the light, all wondering about the meaning, and that snake opposite the obverse head, is it upside down? Will it crawl into the human face's remarkable cilindrical nose? And if you turn it around, you see a jolly foal galloping, you smile at it! These coins are simply medicines against bad moods. It's a funny coin, like many Celtic coins are funny. All those lively horses! Celtic coinage. Iceni (who were living in what's now Norfolk, UK). Uninscribed AR unit, quinar size. Circa 50-40 BC. Bury Diadem type ("Gallo-Belgic XD") type. Uncertain mint in the upper Yare valley. Obv. Diademed head left; snake symbol to left. Rev. Horse leaping left; pellet in ring of pellets above, pellet-in-annulets around. 15 mm, 1.47 gr, 6h. Talbot Bury A type, unlinked group, dies G/9.
..that's interesting...i've had this coin for many years and have yet to see a face on the obverse, no matter which way i look at it Celtic bronze imitation of Phllip ll, Macedon
A big round eye glares at you, upper left are the god's hairs, over a band made of laurels. At the reverse, I see the forepart of a horse to the left, clear mane, breast and legs.
Although I understand about Celtic Art being more abstract, I am not sure what I am seeing when I flip the coins... Celtic Imitation Philip II 2nd C BCE AR Drachm Kugelwange type- Danube Valley - pecunum auction UpsideDown Celtic Britain Iceni Boudicca 61 CE 1.03g Celt Hd r Celtic horse galloping Scarce
This is my one and only Celtic coin. Celtic Tribes Pannonian region Ar Tetradrachm Copying (Interpreting) the types of Philip II of Macedon. Obv laureate? Head of Zeus right. Rv. Man on prancing horse left Lanz 743 200-100 B.C. 12.51 grms 22 mm Photo by W. Hansen
It's more than just pareidolia. There are various design features in Celtic art that have been well known to generations of scholars (both of numismatic and non-numismatic art). [A few online references at the end.] For “Hidden Faces on Celtic Coins” there is Chris Rudd, pp. 41-43, Coin News, November 2019. A couple figures: Another important design feature is "Cheshire cat design": the phenomenon in which focusing on part of the design (i.e., bringing it into the "foreground" of attention) requires one to disattend to another (i.e., allowing to recede into the "background"). It's the same phenomenon described in Gestalst psychology of figure-ground relationships. Here's an example from my collection. I'll try to make it clear. But the same properties can be found in almost any Celtic coin -- that's what many of their collectors appreciate and enjoy about them. This is a Celtic-Thracian Tribal imitation of a bronze coin of Odessos, with a laureate bearded head facing right, as on the prototype. (On the reverse is a horse rider.) Prototype from Odessos (NOT Celtic; not mine, Munzzentrum 184, 56): On the Celtic imitation below: When you rotate the obverse 120 degrees clockwise (not 180', but 120'), there appears to be a left-facing head. This design feature is often called "Rotational Symmetry." My example with features highlighted (sorry, not an artist!). The obverse TWICE, then reverse: Another example from the same tribal group, different dies. Again, the obverse TWICE, then reverse: You can also see various natural forms used in design, e.g., a flower in the center of mine. Just the obverse this time (THREE times): Is that part deliberate or imagined? It can be hard to say for sure for any single shape or form whether it was intended or what all it might have represented. But Celtic art specialists agree that, in general, the "hidden" and "background" designs are a deliberate part of Celtic artwork. Look closely enough and rotate this obverse from a Celtic Tetradrachm sold by NAC and you may find many different images (including a rather large bird, a broad open hand with all four fingers and a thumb, multiple faces, others, and others yet): To the extent that pareidolia (perceiving patterns or definite forms in randomness) is part of the phenomenon, it would probably be more accurate to say that the artform exploited it to turn the reception a creative act of interpretation. Some references likely to be available online that I've found useful & saved in my Celtic biblio (you may need to sign up for free JSTOR account): Doran, Brent. 1995. “Mathematical Sophistication of the Insular Celts: Spirals, Symmetries, and Knots as a Window onto Their World View.” Proceedings of the Harvard Celtic Colloquium 15: 258-289. Frey, Otto-Herman. 2004. "A New Approach to Early Celtic Art." Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy 105 (5): 107-129. Frey & Schwappach. 1973. "Studies in Early Celtic Design." World Archaeology 4 (3): 339-356 [And on Academia from F.P. Schwappach's page: https://www.academia.edu/3403778/Ot...ank_Schwappach_STUDIES_IN_EARLY_CELTIC_DESIGN ] Jacobsthal, Paul. 1935. "Early Celtic Art." Burlington Magazine 67 (390). Jacobsthal, Paul. 1944. Early Celtic Art. Oxford : Clarendon Press. [not sure if this is online] Olmsted, Garrett. 2001. Celtic Art in Transition during the First Century BC. Budapest: Archaeolingua Series 12. [Available in parts from his Academia: https://cornell.academia.edu/garrettolmsted ] Sizer, Walter. 1991. “Mathematical Notions in Preliterate Societies.” The Mathematical Intelligencer 13 (4): 53-60. [not sure if this is online]
