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Message:: [QUOTE="Roman Collector, post: 7830625, member: 75937"]<img src="https://media1.giphy.com/media/sTczweWUTxLqg/giphy.gif?cid=ecf05e47xz1ldp7bzj160jqwh4is6adpdchy9mee7w7fpa6c&rid=giphy.gif&ct=g" class="bbCodeImage wysiwygImage" alt="" unselectable="on" /> You know what that means!! Another installment of "Faustina Friday"!! This coin is neither new nor rare. Its reverse design appears unremarkable, even boring. It's one of those "just standing there" issues that would get a 1/5 on the [USER=19463]@dougsmit[/USER] <a href="https://www.cointalk.com/threads/my-first-formerly-slabbed-coin.364998/#post-4743429" class="internalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://www.cointalk.com/threads/my-first-formerly-slabbed-coin.364998/#post-4743429">scale</a>. [ATTACH=full]1345450[/ATTACH]<blockquote>Faustina I, AD 138-140.Roman orichalcum sestertius, 22.8 g, 31.5 mm, 6 h.Rome, AD 147.Obv: DIVA FAVSTINA, bare-headed and draped bust, right.Rev: AVGVSTA, female figure, veiled, standing left, holding short torch in each hand.Refs: RIC 1120; BMCRE 1516-18; Cohen 91; RCV 4625; Strack 1283.</blockquote> But, as is often the case with ancient coins, there's more here than meets the eye. The figure on the reverse has long been identified as Ceres. Although Wiczay, writing in 1814, describes the reverse figure as "mul." (mulier, meaning woman),[1] Sulzer (1777),[ 2] Cohen (1882),[3] RIC3 (1930),[4] BMCRE4 (1940),[5] and Sear (2002)[6] all identify her explicitly as Ceres. However, this traditional identification of the reverse figure as Ceres may be wrong. As a result of his die-linkage study of the aurei and sestertii of Diva Faustina I, Martin Beckmann has called this longstanding tradition into question. He proposes that the figure on the reverse is none other than Kore (Persephone, Proserpina), the daughter of Ceres.[7] This paradigm shift occurred with the realization that this coin was issued to commemorate the birth of Faustina II's firstborn child in AD 147 and that a figure carrying two torches more likely represented Proserpina than Ceres. Tying the iconography all together is an aureus depicting Faustina I wearing a crown woven of grain ears on the obverse (an image of Ceres) paired with this reverse type (an image of Ceres' daughter). The motif is clear: Ceres paired with her daughter on the coin mirrors Faustina I and her daughter, the occasion being the elevation of Faustina II to the rank of Augustus upon the birth of her first child. Dating the coin and identifying its purpose Beckmann's die studies demonstrated that the obverse inscription on the coinage of Diva Faustina changed from DIVA AVG[VSTA] FAVSTINA to DIVA FAVSTINA with the marriage of Faustina II to Marcus Aurelius in AD 145, moving Faustina I's title of AVGVSTA to the reverse of her coins. The coinage of the period following the imperial wedding is dominated by the figure of Ceres holding a torch and scepter on the aurei and grain ears and scepter on the silver and bronze coinage. I have <a href="https://www.cointalk.com/threads/faustina-friday-–-the-avgvsta-ceres-with-grain-ears-and-torch-issue.382264/" class="internalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://www.cointalk.com/threads/faustina-friday-–-the-avgvsta-ceres-with-grain-ears-and-torch-issue.382264/">previously discussed these types</a>. But suddenly, in the die chain of her aurei, this type disappears and is immediately and completely replaced by the type depicting a female figure with two torches. This change happened approximately half-way between the wedding of Faustina and Marcus in AD 145 and the introduction of the AETERNITAS series in AD 150.[8] This corresponds to the birth of Faustina I's first child (a daughter, Domitia Faustina) on 30 November 147 and the assumption of Faustina II to Augusta the following day.[9] The conclusion that the change in reverse type on the aurei of Faustina I occurred at the same time that Faustina II gave birth and became Augusta is strengthened by comparison of the style of drapery used on the coins of both Faustina the Elder and Younger. An important change in the drapery on some of Diva Faustina's bare-headed busts occurs just after the new reverse type was introduced. On dies df30, df90, and df18 an extra fold of mantle is added to the bust; this extra drapery projects almost horizontally from the front of the bust. [ATTACH=full]1345451[/ATTACH]<blockquote>Faustina I, AV aureus. Obverse die df30, Nomos AG, Auction 11, <a href="https://www.numisbids.com/n.php?p=lot&sid=1234&lot=182" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://www.numisbids.com/n.php?p=lot&sid=1234&lot=182" rel="nofollow">lot 182</a>, 9 October 2015; Ex-Leu 93, lot 30, 10 May 2005 (cited by Beckmann).</blockquote> [ATTACH=full]1345452[/ATTACH]<blockquote>Obverse die df18, Künker, auction 112, <a href="https://www.acsearch.info/search.html?id=310225" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://www.acsearch.info/search.html?id=310225" rel="nofollow">lot 1013</a>, 20 June 2006.</blockquote> This curious style of drapery also appears on the earliest coinage of Faustina the Younger bearing the types VENERI GENETRICI and LAETITIAE PVBLICAE, which began in December AD 147 on the occasion of the birth of her first child and her assumption to the rank of Augusta.[10] [ATTACH=full]1345453[/ATTACH]<blockquote>Faustina II, AV aureus, Numismatica Ars Classica, Auction 105, <a href="https://www.acsearch.info/search.html?id=4954183" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://www.acsearch.info/search.html?id=4954183" rel="nofollow">lot 43</a>, 9 May, 2018.</blockquote> [ATTACH=full]1345454[/ATTACH]<blockquote>Faustina II AV aureus CNG <a href="https://www.acsearch.info/search.html?id=4339295" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://www.acsearch.info/search.html?id=4339295" rel="nofollow">lot 775</a>, 13 September 2017.</blockquote> Beckmann admits "this innovation of drapery style is most likely no more than an unconscious development introduced by a mint engraver, but the coincidence of its appearance on coins of both Faustinas suggest that these dies were produced at about the same time."[11] Beckmann's argument is convincing and demonstrates that Faustina I's female figure holding two torches type was issued at the same time as the coins of Faustina II first went into production in December AD 147. The identity of the reverse figure The schema of a figure holding two torches is an entirely new one in Roman Imperial coinage, which suggests the change was important and not merely the repetition of a known motif.[12] To be sure, on the Republican denarii of M. Volteius (RRC 385/3, 78 BC), Ceres is depicted in a chariot drawn by two serpents and she holds two torches in front of her. [ATTACH=full]1345459[/ATTACH]<blockquote>AR denarius, M. Volteius, RRC 385/3. <a href="https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/C_R-8495" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/C_R-8495" rel="nofollow">British Museum Collection</a>.</blockquote> Yet, the pose of this figure of Ceres is nothing like the stand-alone figure seen on the coins of Faustina. Rather, the Faustina coin calls to mind depictions in classical art of Kore (Persephone, Proserpina). Typically, a two-torch figure is identified as Kore in iconographic schemes where she is shown attending Demeter, who is in turn shown sitting on a cista. [ATTACH=full]1345460[/ATTACH]<blockquote>Marble votive relief depicting Demeter (Ceres) enthroned, and Kore (Persephone, Proserpina) standing with two torches. Eleusis. 500-475 BC. Height 78 cm, width 56 cm, thickness 9-12 cm. Eleusis Archaeological Museum. Inv. No. 5085. <a href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Demeter_and_Kore,_marble_relief,_500-475_BC,_AM_Eleusis,_081135.jpg" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Demeter_and_Kore,_marble_relief,_500-475_BC,_AM_Eleusis,_081135.jpg" rel="nofollow">Used with permission</a>.</blockquote> [ATTACH=full]1345461[/ATTACH]<blockquote>Stela from temple of Demeter and Kore at Eleusis, showing Demeter (Ceres) seated on a cista attended by Kore with two torches (M. Homolle, "Deux bas-reliefs Athéniens du 4me siècle," Bulletin de Correspondance Hellénique 5 1881: 194-196, pl. 9, as reproduced in Beckmann (2012), p. 60).</blockquote> Beckmann notes the existence of numerous other representations of Kore and Demeter (Ceres) in classical art[13] and suggests that the reverse type under discussion is that of Kore and may be "an allusion to Faustina the Younger on coins of her mother." He further notes that "the figure with two torches is <a href="https://www.cointalk.com/threads/matronly-garments-the-stola-and-palla.346585/" class="internalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://www.cointalk.com/threads/matronly-garments-the-stola-and-palla.346585/">dressed as a matron</a>, which Kore was not but which Faustina the Younger, in her new role as mother, most certainly was. This in turn would tie this new type to the birth of her first daughter."[14] The meaning of the issue: Faustina I as Ceres, Faustina II as Kore If the figure with two torches was intended to represent Faustina II as Kore/Proserpina, then the association of mother and daughter with the divine pair of Kore and Ceres is intensified by the issue of a new bust type showing Faustina I wearing a wreath of grain in the manner of Ceres.[15] [ATTACH=full]1345462[/ATTACH]<blockquote>Faustina II, AV aureus. CNG Triton XXI, <a href="https://www.acsearch.info/search.html?id=4673881" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://www.acsearch.info/search.html?id=4673881" rel="nofollow">lot 768</a>, 9 January 2018.</blockquote> Moving beyond Beckmann's identification of the reverse figure as representing Faustina the Younger as Kore, I'd like to conclude with my own observations about the coin's iconography. There are a disproportionate number of coins depicting Ceres that were issued for Faustina the Elder and this is not coincidental. Andreas Alföldi argues that the connection between the empress and Ceres goes beyond mere concern over the grain supply or her devotion to the goddess.[16] It is more personal; Antoninus Pius was devoted to the sanctuary at Eleusis,[17] which had a temple where Faustina was worshiped as the new Demeter (Ceres) and had her own hierophant.[18] Issuing a coin to celebrate her daughter's birth and assumption to the rank of Augusta strengthened the association of both Faustina the Elder and Younger with Ceres, Kore, and the goddesses' cult at Eleusis. Moreover, it demonstrated that this association with divinity continued with Faustina II, even after the death of Faustina I. Perhaps the coin is intended to depict both Ceres and Kore at the same time. Faustina II is depicted as the Kore, the daughter of Ceres, just as she is the daughter of Faustina I; however, with the death of her mother, she now appears in <a href="https://www.cointalk.com/threads/matronly-garments-the-stola-and-palla.346585/" class="internalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://www.cointalk.com/threads/matronly-garments-the-stola-and-palla.346585/">matronly garments</a> herself, supplanting Faustina I, and becoming the new incarnation of Ceres herself. ~~~ Notes 1. Wiczay, Michael A. and Felice Caronni. Musei Hedervarii in Hungaria numos antiquos graecos et latinos descripsit. Vol. 2, Caronni, Vienna 1814, p. 264. 2. Sulzer, Johann Caspar, and Jacob Sulzer. Numophylacium Sulzerianum numos antiquos Graecos et Romanos aureos argenteos aereos sis tens olim Iacobi Sulzeri. Ettinger, 1777, no. 1322 p. 159. 3. Henry Cohen, Description historique des monnaies frappées sous l'Empire Romain, Tome II, Paris, 1882, p. 420. 4. Mattingly, Harold and Edward A. Sydenham. The Roman Imperial Coinage. III, Spink, 1930, p. 163. 5. Mattingly, Harold. Coins of the Roman Empire in the British Museum: Antoninus Pius to Commodus. Vol. 4, British Museum, 1940, p. 243. 6. Sear, David R. Roman Coins and Their Values. II, Spink, 2002, p. 271. 7. Beckmann, Martin. Diva Faustina: Coinage and Cult in Rome and the Provinces. American Numismatic Society, 2012, pp. 58-62. 8. For dating of the AETERNITAS series, see Beckmann (2012), chapter 5, pp. 63-72. 9. Known with certainty from the Fasti Ostienses for AD 147 (tablet Pb, lines 13 ff). See Levick, Barbara. Faustina I and II: Imperial Women of the Golden Age. Oxford University Press, 2014, p. 116. 10. Beckmann, Martin, Faustina the Younger: Coinage, Portraits, and Public Image, A.N.S. Numismatic Studies 43, American Numismatic Society, New York, 2021, pp. 23 ff. I have discussed these coins previously at Coin Talk, both <a href="https://www.cointalk.com/threads/faustina-friday-%E2%80%93-juno-lucina-and-the-birth-of-fadilla.378267/#post-7360406" class="internalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://www.cointalk.com/threads/faustina-friday-%E2%80%93-juno-lucina-and-the-birth-of-fadilla.378267/#post-7360406">before</a> and <a href="https://www.cointalk.com/threads/victorinus-first-issue.381361/#post-7615420" class="internalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://www.cointalk.com/threads/victorinus-first-issue.381361/#post-7615420">after</a> the publication of Beckmann's die-study. 11. Beckmann (2012), p. 59. 12. Ibid., p. 61. 13. Citing LIMC IV (1988) s.v. Demeter 844-892, esp. Demetra e Kore 864-870 (L. Beschi). 14. Beckmann (2012), p. 61. 15. Ibid., p. 61. 16. Alföldi, Andreas. "Redeunt Saturnia Regna. VII : Frugifer-Triptolemos Im Ptolemaïsch -Römischen Herrscherkult." Chiron , vol. 9, 1979, pp. 552–606, specifically pp. 586-589. 17. Eleusis, in the outskirts of Athens, of Eleusian mysteries fame. These mysteries involved elaborate rituals devoted to the worship of Demeter (Ceres). 18. Mylonas, George E. Eleusis and the Eleusian Mysteries. Princeton University Press, 1961, pp 155, 179.[/QUOTE]

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