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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;Parthicus, post: 26049039, member: 81887&quot;][ATTACH=full]1656260[/ATTACH] </p><p>Roman Empire.&nbsp; AR denarius.&nbsp; Elagabalus (218- 222 CE).&nbsp; Obverse: Laureate bust left, scraggly beard, &quot;horn&quot; at top of head, legend around IMP ANTONINVS PIVS AVG.&nbsp; Reverse: Elagabalus standing left, sacrificing above tripod-altar, holding palm-branch in left hand, star in field legend around SVMMVS SACERDOS AVG (High Priest [and] Augustus).&nbsp; This coin: Frank S. Robinson Auction 126, lot 187 (December 6, 2024).</p><p><br /></p><p>Elagabalus was born around 203 CE and raised in Emesa, Syria. His grandmother, Julia Maesa, was the sister-in law of the emperor Septimius Severus. Despite his youth he became a priest of a locally important god, Elagabal, from which his most commonly used name Elagabalus is derived. (His original birth name is not certain, but may have been Bassianus, and he reigned as Marcus Aurelius Antoninus Augustus.) In 217, Caracalla was killed by Macrinus, who exiled Julia Maesa and her family to their Syrian estate. From there, she was able to organize the overthrow and death of Macrinus, and had her grandson named emperor in 218. The new emperor instituted worship of Elagabal at Rome and showed little interest in the traditional gods. Overall, he showed exactly as much maturity and restraint as you would expect for a teenager suddenly given virtually unlimited resources and authority. He spent lavishly on luxuries and parties, often giving outrageously expensive gifts. (At one dinner party, he allegedly had so many flower petals dropped on the guests that some were smothered to death.) He was married and divorced five times; one of his wives was a Vestal Virgin, which was extremely illegal under Roman law, but who would dare to prosecute him? He also had several male lovers, and some sources claim he dabbled as a male prostitute. Some of his other actions have led a few recent historians to suggest Elagabalus was actually transgender; I personally don&#039;t find the arguments compelling, but thought I should at least mention the idea to be fair. There are quite a few vivid stories of him in the ancient sources, many of them unprintable here, and while many of these stories may be false or exaggerated, they paint a consistent portrait of a thoroughly debauched young man who had no business being in power. By 222, Elagabalus&#039;s grandmother could sense the growing unhappiness with his reign, and she had him murdered, and her other grandson, Severus Alexander, took over the throne. </p><p><br /></p><p>The reverse of this coin shows very clearly Elagabalus&#039; commitment to his religion, listing his title of High Priest even before that of Augustus and showing him in the middle of a sacrifice.&nbsp; Or, in the colorful description in Seth W. Stevenson&#039;s &quot;Dictionary of Roman Coins&quot; (1889): &quot;We here indeed see him officiating at those rites, for which functions, as his hateful biography informs us, that loathsome young maniac &#039;circumcised himself and abstained from swine&#039;s flesh&#039;.&nbsp; These coins also exhibit the sort of dress which he used in those sacerdotal ministrations- viz.,&nbsp; something between the Phoenician sacred robe and the cloak of the Medes, according to Herodianus&#039; description of it; and as the author says in another passage, &#039;he (Elagabalus) walked in barbarian costume, with purple tunic interwoven with gold, long-sleeved and down to the feet.&#039;&quot; The star in the field probably symbolizes the sun (Helios), which was associated with the god Heliogabalus.&nbsp; (However, the form Elagabalus has also been plausibly derived from the Arabic allah al-jabal (God of the Mountain).&nbsp; My guess is that there&#039;s some syncretism going on here.)&nbsp; The &quot;horn&quot; seen on the obverse portrait is also of interest.&nbsp; Traditionally, it has been assumed to be a symbolic manifestation of divinity, as seen on some Hellenistic portraiture.&nbsp; However, a more recent theory suggests that it is actually the dried penis of a sacrificial bull, which the priest wore during ceremonies.&nbsp; Whatever its significance, the horn appeared in issues from about the last year of Elagabalus&#039; reign, but is absent again in his very last coins struck.&nbsp; Please post your coins of Elagabalus, or whatever else is related.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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