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A Roman Republican coin WITHOUT an animal reverse
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<p>[QUOTE="DonnaML, post: 4624144, member: 110350"]OK, I think I finally get what you're looking at. Before, all I saw was a fourth prong extending from the prow directly above the three-pronged ram. Now, if I look closely and exercise my imagination a little, I see two ears, a round eye, a snout, an open mouth, and possibly a long tongue protruding from it, all right in front of the fourth prong:</p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]1144574[/ATTACH]</p><p><br /></p><p>I am astounded that anyone was able, without magnification, to engrave a die with a detail like that, which is completely invisible to the naked eye (at least to mine)! The entire wolf's head, if that's what it is, is barely over one millimeter wide. Never mind the even smaller details within it. It seems impossible to me. Perhaps the engravers* did use water or crystal as a magnification device?</p><p><br /></p><p>* John Melville Jones's <i>Dictionary of Ancient Roman Coins</i> (London 1990) disputes that celator or caelator was a term actually used in ancient times specifically for coin die engravers, as opposed to being a term used more broadly to describe modellers or engravers in metal in general. He contends that <i>signator</i> or <i>scalpto</i>r are more likely terms. (See entry for "Caelator" at p. 43.)[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>
[QUOTE="DonnaML, post: 4624144, member: 110350"]OK, I think I finally get what you're looking at. Before, all I saw was a fourth prong extending from the prow directly above the three-pronged ram. Now, if I look closely and exercise my imagination a little, I see two ears, a round eye, a snout, an open mouth, and possibly a long tongue protruding from it, all right in front of the fourth prong: [ATTACH=full]1144574[/ATTACH] I am astounded that anyone was able, without magnification, to engrave a die with a detail like that, which is completely invisible to the naked eye (at least to mine)! The entire wolf's head, if that's what it is, is barely over one millimeter wide. Never mind the even smaller details within it. It seems impossible to me. Perhaps the engravers* did use water or crystal as a magnification device? * John Melville Jones's [I]Dictionary of Ancient Roman Coins[/I] (London 1990) disputes that celator or caelator was a term actually used in ancient times specifically for coin die engravers, as opposed to being a term used more broadly to describe modellers or engravers in metal in general. He contends that [I]signator[/I] or [I]scalpto[/I]r are more likely terms. (See entry for "Caelator" at p. 43.)[/QUOTE]
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A Roman Republican coin WITHOUT an animal reverse
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