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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;lehmansterms, post: 3509810, member: 80804&quot;]More likely, it would appear, the (probably) lesser-skilled engraver doing the legends simply blundered into the tips of the wreath-ties when cutting the legend rather than deliberately morphing them into letters. Roman coins almost never include &quot;secret&quot; meanings or rebuses (you don&#039;t need to tell me about the EQVIT series by Aureolus here - there are isolated exceptions to every rule in a field as large as Roman numismatics) or designs and objects that morph into different forms or different objects, such as those you would not be surprised to find in Celtic-influenced art. The only example I can think of offhand is the heads of infants Gemellus and Germanicus emerging from crossed cornucopiae on this sestertius in poshumous honor of Drusus, struck by Tiberius (this type was copied later in the RIC series, as well). </p><p><img src="http://www.stoa.org/albums/album90/09_Drusus_sestertius.sized.jpg" class="bbCodeImage wysiwygImage" alt="" unselectable="on" /></p><p><a href="http://www.stoa.org/gallery/album90/09_Drusus_sestertius?full=1" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="http://www.stoa.org/gallery/album90/09_Drusus_sestertius?full=1" rel="nofollow">http://www.stoa.org/gallery/album90/09_Drusus_sestertius?full=1</a>&nbsp; </p><p>Even this isn&#039;t quite a case of the cornucopiae &quot;morphing&quot; into heads, the heads are merely represented as busts atop the cornucopiae.</p><p>To go on with this theme a bit, the piece pictured below happens to be one of the very first group of ancient coins I ever owned, acquired, ca. 1957-58. For over a decade I believed it was an unpublished type of posthumous dupondius of Faustina Sr. on which appeared to be the head and arms of an infant emerging from a cornucopiae held by Vesta (I additionally thought for years that it must be Faustina) - but that was a stretch of years which began when I was 8. According to the references I eventually acquired, it&#039;s actually the Palladium.</p><p><img src="http://www.stoa.org/albums/album93/ML21_Faustina_I_Augusta_as.sized.jpg" class="bbCodeImage wysiwygImage" alt="" unselectable="on" /></p><p><a href="http://www.stoa.org/gallery/album93/ML21_Faustina_I_Augusta_as?full=1" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="http://www.stoa.org/gallery/album93/ML21_Faustina_I_Augusta_as?full=1" rel="nofollow">http://www.stoa.org/gallery/album93/ML21_Faustina_I_Augusta_as?full=1</a>[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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