Your Most Interesting Coin

My most interesting coin is an incredibly fine barbarous imitation of Constantines VLPP type.

this is interesting to me because unlike many of the crudely produced ones, this coin shows some very fine artistry.
Many barbs were produced by untrained artisans, and not artists - explaining the poor artistic quality.

my hupothesis is that a local Celtic artist took his own artistic liberties in creating the die for this coin. The legends are blundered, the figures inaccurate, but it showcases a certain level of what I consider to be “fine art.” I’m certain the celator was proud of his product.

 

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@Valentinian, many thanks for the valuable elucidation. Without even looking at the article, your observation about the Roman frescoes with multiple vanishing points set off a few more synapses, back to the self-alleged 'reverse precedent' in early Modern art.
...About which, yet another digression ensues. (You Were Warned....) Starting from late Cezanne, while his landscapes use aerial perspective, his still-lifes are only cooler. They use the equivalent of multiple vanishing points, but on the scale of, say, a table top. Neither of these terms is likely to be original, but they evoke something like 'temporal' or even 'tactile' perspective --attempting to convey the phenomenon of looking at different parts of a motif in real time. A cloth might divide a table into two visual components, with the line of each one diverging at slightly different angles.
This is subtle enough to still count as 'Post-Impressionism.' Along with some of Picasso's early work. ...Except, from here, the early Cubists take this ball, and make some serious yardage with it.
...So much for precedent in 'the art world,' as far as Cubism is concerned. Martin Scorsese made a fantastic documentary (seen on Kanopy) about the no less profound influence of early cinema on Picasso and Braque. All about trying to convey how people perceive space as a real, 'concrete,' but as such innately temporal, subjective experience.
...From here, it's too early to have any idea whether this made any sense or not. ...But you sure did. I got some real traction from your comments. Thanks Lots!

 

@hotwheelsearl, Yep, that's a fantastic example, and from here, You Nailed It. With barbarous AEs, you get the whole spectrum, from people 'phoning it in' to, as you said, something far more creatively proactive, within easy throwing distance, at least, of fine art.

 

What I consider my most interesting ancient coin is this quadrans of Trajanus.
I am new in collecting ancient coins and I wanted some Trajanus examples as I like his portrait the most.


Not a spectacular condition (although not bad at all) but it is quite a rare coin (RIC 693) because of the obverse inscription (IMP TRAIANO AVG and not IMP CAES NERVA...)

 

@ambr0zie, the reverse of that is Really Cool. Is that the she-wolf, minus the twins?

 

Exactly.
In a very deffensive pose.

I find the reverses with animals very interesting.

 

Very neat! I don’t think I’ve ever seen a statuary representation of the wolf in a defensive pose like that.

there’s a Etruscan bronze chimera in a similar pose though:

 

That's exactly what I'm collecting: Interesting Coins! I'm going for the beauties, but also for the beasts. I have many dozens of Interesting Coins. Lying awake in the morning, I kept pondering which - but like @ominus1 , my favorites keep changing all the time.

Medieval islamic coins form a big part of my collection, and I'm all the time searching for islamic coins with pictures, especially of animals. Here are some animals you don't see every day in the streets: dragons! With large biting jaws, of the twelfth century. And it's a great question what type of dragons they are: the benevolent or the malicious kind?



Well, it took me and friends some hours of blissful puzzling to find out these dragons probably are benevolent jinns that are there to protect the sultan, in this case Sultan Sanjar of the Great Seljuq dynasty (512-552 AH = 1118-1157 AD), arguably one of the mightiest rulers of that dynasty. Probably because he had some little help of these dragons.



You find them on the top and bottom of the right picture, the reverse of this gold dinar, minted in Herat (Persia). 24.5 mm, 3.86 gr. Album 1687.

 

@Pellinore, that is truly great. For Seljuqs, I would still be looking for contemporaneous examples in bronze. But your historical context is keenly appreciated.

 

I guess, all things considered, this is the most interesting coin, at least pertaining to Athenian coinage of the 6th-5th centuries BC.

Weighing 17.8 grams, this archaic tetradrachm has a reversed and inverted ethnic on the reverse, in addition to an inverted owl and flipped olive leaves. It seems that these anomalies on the reverse were caused by an error on the part of the die engraver, who failed to engrave the reverse design into the die for the correct orientation of the elements on the finished coin - he must have had quite a night the day before.

Additionally Athena's helmet on this example displays distinct dots, which I assume are rivets, something not seen too often with coins of this period.

This coin came to me by way of Dr. Busso Peus Nachf. It also has a David Sear certificate of authenticity.

I find this coin most endearing, from its crude style, the the Harpo Marx rendition of Athena's profile, to the owl's spiked hairdo. The owl seems to have one leg raised, as if doing a gigue.

 

Totally unfair question - I can't pick just one!

One of the ones that sprung to mind first was this one:

Unknown
AE11, 0.77g
Obv: Helmeted bust?
Rev: Standing figure holding two objects



I love a good challenge, and this is one of the only coins I have ever met that has kept me stumped for years. Found it in a lot of mostly junk AE from Ptolemaic Egypt and Roman from the same region - it clearly isn't Greek or Roman. The style suggests Kushan, but they didn't make AE coinage that small. Too clean to be Kashmir Smast, and Kushano-Sassanian doesn't fit either. I have honestly no clue where or when this coin was made; not even a guess, and that fascinates me.

Also, it's hard to make out, but the reverse figure just might have a face, too

 

...Wish you could stop me, but is it even possible that it's some (maybe unpublished) Arab-Byzantine issue, from vaguely the same part of the world as the rest of them?

 

I love every archaic, retrograde thing about it.

 

Far too small - this coin is only 11mm, and I have never seen an Arab-Byzantine coin below about 15-17mm, plus they usually have sharp strikes but confused and jumbled motifs - this one I would wager is probably from before 300 AD, wherever it's from.

 

The first denarius. It was struck from looted silver in order to pay the Roman legions fighting Hannibal.

 

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In my eyes, my most interesting coin probably is this one here:

Archbishopric of Magdeburg, under Albrecht von Käfernburg, bracteate penny, ca. 1220–1232. Obv: OICI – IVSDV; St. Maurice, nimbate and wearing armour, standing facing, holding cross and lance flag; below, church building with two towers and an arch; inside, cranium relic. Rev: negative design (bracteate). 23mm, 0.68g. Ref: Berger 1586; Slg. Hauswaldt 167; Slg. Bonhoff 712.

This is one of only few medieval coins showing a relic or directly referencing a recent event. In 1220, Achbishop Albrecht managed to acquire what was believed to be the cranium of St. Maurice, the patron saint of Magdeburg. The new relic was hoped to attract pilgrims and donations, which Albrecht needed to rebuild Magdeburg's cathedral. The old building had been destroyed in a fire in 1207. As a kind of advertisement, the bishop struck a series of three bracteates depicting the skull relic. This is one of them.

 

Unfortunately my most interesting coin is not an an ancient piece. It's the 1848 CAL. U.S. $2.50 gold coin. This coin was made from the first shipment of gold that was received on the East Coast from California in 1848. Long time editor of The Red Book, Richard Yeoman, wrote a classic article about it in the late 1940s.



Instead of re-posting an old article, here is a link to the piece I posted here about this coin:

https://www.cointalk.com/threads/a-brief-history-of-the-1848-cal-quarter-eagle.336349/

 

While not exactly an ancient, the design is pretty old and one of my favorites for a coin.

Z



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And here's a bit more modern (and colorful) example . . . .