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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;kevin McGonigal, post: 4471620, member: 72790&quot;]As we all know (or better remember) we are coming up to Mothers&#039; day this Sunday and I thought it might be a nice idea to take a look at coins associated with that day. Some of these coins celebrate Fecunditas, fruitfulness, fertility, mothers doing what mothers do, have and rear children, something a lot harder then than today considering the rate of child mortality. Some are connected with goddesses of motherhood like Isis, Cybele, and Juno. Some with women who are famous for their more famous children. Perhaps readers, taking a close look at their own coins, might discover that they have coins that are more associated with mothers and motherhood than they think they have, maybe even a Mater Castrorum and if so they might want to post them and write something about them. Two of the coins below are Ancient Greek (Ptolemaic Egypt), three are Roman, one Roman provincial and one Byzantine.</p><p><br /></p><p>First up (from upper left to right) is a Ptolemaic Tetradrachma of Ptolemy VI known as Philometer which means, like a dutiful son, he loved his mother. Next to him is a medium bronze of his consort, Cleopatra I (not THE Cleopatra) made up to look like Isis who became a great mother goddess, not just to ancient Egyptians but to later Greeks and Romans where she was very popular as a &quot;Mystery Religion&quot; Deity who looked after her devotees in this life and in the hereafter, just as a good mother would. Number three is a Roman provincial tetradrachma of Antioch, one of the two figures with the most well known love-hate relationships in all of history, Agrippina, mother of Nero. Suffice it to say that he will not be sending her a card this year. Next is a Roman Sestertius of Julia Domna who reared two sons, one of whom turned into a nasty, murderous, fratricidal monster (in other words a typical Roman emperor). Unfortunately the reverse of this coin is so well worn, or poorly struck that the reverse is illegible but it shows Cybele, an Eastern import of another mother goddess and the inscription reads &quot;Mater Deum&quot;, Mother of the gods (Caracalla and Geta?). A version of this and similar reverses is pretty common on her silver coins. The fifth coin is a denarius of Caracalla praising the INDVLG FECVNDAE (kind fruitfulness) of his mother, Julia Domna, who is shown seated on a throne. I guess he was grateful to his mother for having him, but not for her fruitfulness going a bit too far with his younger brother, Geta. The sixth coin is a double denarius of Otacila Severa, wife of Philip I and mother of Phillip II with an invocation to Juno, who was the goddess of motherhood and protector of women in child birth. IVNO CONSERVAT. Sometimes it worked. Lastly is a Byzantine billon trachy of Emperor Manuel I Comenus, ca. 1175 showing him being crowned by the most famous mother of Medieval times of both Western Europe and the Eastern Empire, the Blessed Mother. It&#039;s hard to see but on that coin is written MP THU, Mother of God.</p><p><br /></p><p>Perhaps readers would like to post some coins here from their own collections connected with mothers as a way of celebrating the day with us.[ATTACH=full]1112515[/ATTACH][/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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