Coins that go bump in the night Part IV: Ruined Druids & Bodily Fluids/post your spookies!

To start off this years deadtime stories and killer coins, I would like to share my latest Celtic, Celter Skelter, druidic coin!



What!? You didn't know that the culture that commited human sacrifice, (im)famously built Stonehenge


and may have also been the reason/excuse Caesar needed to go on and kill some estimated 2,000,000 Gauls also has coinage! And what if I was to tell you that the coinage is also bizarre, macabre and unexplained?
I'm not sure what freezes the blood more quickly, the head or the claws on the wolf
Don't stare too long nor look into the dead eyes of the mangled head on the obverse though or you may never look away!

CARNUTES (Beauce region) (2nd - 1st centuries BC) Gossip with the diabolical head and the wolf
16.4mm, 3.81g. R3
LT.manque - DT.2612 - BN.? - PK.43 var. - BMCC.S285
Obv: Spooky head on the left, a drop-shaped globule, possibly human flesh, in the mouth.
Rev: Stylized and gendered (if you don't know what that means, look closer) wolf on the left, the tail between the legs and a cross/crucifix over the back.
Unearthed Sept 2021 Burgundy region of France

"The Carnutes would have participated in the legendary expedition from Bellovese to Italy. They formed the geographical center of Gaul and, long before the start of the Gallic Wars, Roman merchants knew the way to Genabum (Orleans), then a large commercial center. The Carnutes were also famous for their forest where the annual meeting of the Druids was held. At the start of the War, Caesar had wintered among the Carnutes in 57 BC and imposed them as King Tasgetios, who was assassinated in 54 BC The following year, they submitted but at the beginning from 52 BC, they are perhaps at the origin of the revolt which will raise the whole of Gaul. It is possible that the conspirators met during a Druidic assembly. The Carnutes massacred the colonists and the Roman merchants of Genabum (Orleans) under the leadership of Cotuatos and Conconnétodumnos. Caesar came to besiege the city he took, looted and burned down, marking the start of hostilities. The Carnutes then provided a contingent of twelve thousand men to the relief army in order to free Alesia. After the fall of Vercingetorix, the following year, the Romans carried out a new campaign of pacification and Caesar punished the assassins of the previous year."



Most ancient coins have what can be considered a severed head, the bust or portrait of someone, without a body. This coin however actually depicts a recently severed Christian head!
Just don't forget sometimes when you severe a head they don't stop talking back



Anatolia & al-Jazira (Post-Seljuk). Artuqids (Mardin). Husam al-Din Yuluq Arslan, (AH 580-597 / AD 1184-1200).
Dirham Bronze (31.7 mm 12.1 g)
Obv: Helmeted Turk seated cross-legged, wearing chain mail, holding sword horizontally behind his head with his right hand and severed, helmeted head by the plume with his left hand; in field to left, 'Nur al-Din Atabeg' in Kufic.
Rev: In inner field, 'al-Nasir li-din / Allah Amir / al-Mu'minin'; in inner margin, 'al Malik al-Afzal 'Ali wa al-Malik al Zahir Ghazi bin al-Malik al-Nasir Yusuf'; in outer margin, 'Husam al-Din Yuluq Arslan Malik Diyarbakr bin il-Ghazi bin Artuq duriba sannah sitt wa tis'in wa khamsami'a'; all in Kufic.
Spengler & Sayles 36.1. Purchased from Lydia Numismatics July 2021



Now that Septimius September is over I can share this disturbing creature in a thread more suited to a distasteful audience! Straight out of a creature feature that your mommy and daddy wouldn't let you watch as a kid, this monster looks a lot like the types of man eating dragons the ancients feared and wrote about...


Septimius Severus (193-211 AD). AE Tetrassarion (29 mm, 12.66 g). Thrace, Pautalia.
Obv. ΑΥΤ Κ Λ CΕΠ CΕΥΗΡΟC Π, Laureate head to right.
Rev. ΟΥΛΠΙΑC ΠΑΥ/ΤΑΛΙΑC, Aesculapius riding winged serpent right, holding serpent-entwined staff.
Ruzicka 345; Varbanov 4687.
Green patina. Fine to very fine.
From the François Righetti Collection.
Purchased from Auctiones GmbH Sept 2021


Of course we have to share our beauties along with our beasties. Just beware for if you drop this coin on the wrong side you wont be staring at a little nymph but rather a gorgon with a tongue sticky enough to lick the skin from the bone and fangs that make Dracula look like a pussy cat.



Macedonia, Neapolis, Hemidrachm, 424-350 BC (14 mm, 1,80 gr)
Obverse: facing gorgoneion with protruding tongue Reverse: head of the nymph of Neapolis to right, her hair coiled around her head and with a bun at the back, around Ν-Ε / Ο-Π. Purchased from Savoca June 2021

If you missed out on the last three years of gore gallore here is the original "Coins that go bump in the night": https://www.cointalk.com/threads/coins-that-go-bump-in-the-night.324528/
Part 2: The Vampire strikes back: https://www.cointalk.com/threads/co...night-part-ii-the-vampire-strikes-bat.348366/
Part 3: Count Drach-ula's feast
https://www.cointalk.com/threads/coins-that-go-bump-in-the-night-3-count-drachm-ulas-feast.367628/



or for you Lana Del Rey fans this'll kill ya!




So please get spooky, do your best to scare us all and share those coins that give you a chill down your spine when you hold them and tell us about your coins that go bump in the night!

 

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Dear Ryro,
In keeping with the season....

Do you know why witches can't have babies?

(Their husbands have Haloweenies)
J.T.

 

Sounds like they are lonely like skeletons. Though, skeletons are lonely cause they have nobody in the whole world.


Now let's get back to spooky coins...

 

Congrats Ryro!
Really like your Neapolis hemidrachm.
I saw one in a recent auction but the price got too close to the sky.

I think this coin is spooky


Unfortunately it is spooky not only because of the look, but because of the fact that I can't bet on its authenticity. It is similar to a known fake but not a die match. The almond somehow Asian eyes are also not a good sign, in theory.

Another one that gives me the creeps is this Seleucid


OK, Athena was not known primarily for her beauty, but ........

Somehow it reminds me of the Twin Peaks dwarf, who gave me BIG creeps when I was 5

 

...badoom-tish!

 

It looks like it was impaled with a...ohhhhhhhh!

 

Great coins and great call out!
David Lynch had an eye for the macabre and the ancient.
Check out Venus hiding in the background:


Here's a very creepy faced Dionysus who may or may not have just cut off and placed Silenus face on a mystica!


Antoninus Pius
Phrygia. Laodiceia ad Lycum. AE 19, 4.79g. Phrygia, Laodiceia ad Lycum, Under Antoninus Pius, magistrate P. Ailios Dionysios Sabinianos. Obv: ΛΑΟΔΙΚΕΩΝ Draped bust of Dionysus right, with ivy-wreath. Rx: ΑΙΛ - ΔΙΟΝV - CΙΟC Mask of Silenus with ivy-wreath lying on cista mystica, around which a serpent twines, with both tail and crested and bearded head right; at left, pedum over which a pair of cymbals hangs. BM 96, pl. 35,6 (same obverse die). SNG Copenhagen 532. Delightful reverse type, fine style. VF. Purchased from Savoca Sept 2021

 

Last time I saw a face like Uberitas' it was in a haunted house!




Trebonianus Gallus, AD 251-253.
Roman AR antoninianus, 5.43 g, 20.1 mm, 6 h.
Antioch, first series, AD 251-252.
Obv: IMP C C VIB TREB GALLVS P F AVG, radiate, draped and cuirassed bust, right; •••• below.
Rev: VBERITAS AVG, Uberitas standing left, holding purse and cornucopiae; •••• in exergue.
Refs: RIC 92; Cohen 125; RCV 9652; Hunter p. cvi; ERIC II 63.

 

I remember the talking severed head scene from the movie: “Tormented” (1960) — The fact that I actually sat myself down and watched that movie from beginning to end is in itself disturbing.

This coin is disturbingly interesting.

 

BOO!








Sicily Kamarina AE Onkia. 413 BC to 405 BC. Sear 1064. Calciatti III.54.18. Diameter = 13 mm. Weight = 1.16 grams. Obverse Gorgon. Reverse Owl Grasping Lizard.

 

Freaky Uberitas, RC!
Whenever I can see good detail on the reverse of Roman denarii,

it makes me wish there was less detail!
They just look like ghouls

 

ANONYMOUS ROMAN REPUBLIC
AR Denarius
OBVERSE: Helmeted head of Roma right; behind, X
REVERSE: The Dioscuri galloping right; in exergue, ROMΛ in raised letters within linear frame
Struck at Rome 214-213 BC
19.8mm, 3.45g
Crawford 46/1(b)

 

...welp, i reckon i should post a zombie coin...here's one of my 4th century fractionals whose peepers are spooky (and i just pulled up the Hooters again) lQQkin'

 

Herennius Etruscus bronze Moesia Inferior

 

Happy Halloween. Here is a strange pair:

Human-headed sandworm
with
"Mistress of animals" Potnia Theron


LYDIA, Philadelphia. Titus 69-79 AD. AE18, 4.46g
Obv: TITOΣ KAI-ΣAP; Laureate head right.
Rev: ΦΛABI ΦΙΛAΔΕΛΦEΩN; Facing female statue; lion to left and right.
Ref: RPC 1330

 

That Carnutes is pretty nightmarish, @Ryro.... I love it!

My Halloween ready Ghost of Tarpeia, which I don't think I'll get tired of posting each and every year :





This year it'll be joined by a proper horror show of a coin, picked up in yesterday's Obolos auction:

 

Certainly some very grotesque & disturbing images on this thread......you people are weird, in a good way......thank you!!!

 

Simply beautiful sculptor I've always fallen over myself for images that can give a portrayal of fabric in stone
And what's up with us males projecting that every woman with a snake as being phallic?... though, sometimes coins like that make it hard to refute as she appears to be putting it to her lips
@sand that Sicilian design reminds me of another Sicilian of mine,




as well as one massive MONSTER from Olbia A

SKYTHIA Olbia - Face Proto Money
437-410 BC
Obv: facing gorgon's head. Rev: sea eagle flying right. 65.4 mm, 89.7 grams. Poor. Scarce.
Literature Sear 1682. Purchased from Timeline Auctions Feb 2021

How about a rare, more archaic looking despite being later than the more common type, skull headed Ketos monster for our mash?

CARIA. Halikarnassos. Circa 460-440 BC. Hemiobol (Silver, 7 mm, 0.49 g). AΛ Head and neck of ketos to right. Rev. Eight-rayed star within incuse square. Apparently unpublished apart from Kagan & Kritt p. 263, note 10 and pl. 47, 6. Well struck and clear; the second known example (see CNG e-auction 207, 2009, 193 - but legend incomplete). Very fine.
Purchased from Savoca Aug 2021

 

@Ryro That's a fascinating, gigantic, cast Gorgon coin from Olbia. The Gorgon was a mysterious part of ancient Greek culture. And good nightmare fuel, for ancient Greek children.





Image From "Clash Of The Titans" 1981 Film

 

In Churchville, NY we have haunted houses & haunted cemeteries .