Finally arrived: Second Punic War-era anonymous "H" series quinarius

After well over a month my package from Agora finally found its way out of whatever USPS black hole it had fell into and showed up in my mailbox this afternoon. This quinarius is from the anonymous "H" series, minted in Southeast Italy(some sources specifically mention Apulia) during the Second Punic War. This coin also has some excellent provenance, from the RBW collection and before that from the Rindge collection sold at Malter XXX. I posted a scan of the RBW envelope and tag at the end, but if anyone has the catalog I'd love a scan of the page with this coin as well.

Roman Republic AR quinarius(16.3 mm, 1.93 g, 11 h). Anonymous. ca. 211-210 B.C. Southeast Italian mint. Helmeted head of Roma right, V behind / ROMA, the Dioscuri riding right, each holds a spear; H below. Crawford 85/1a; Sydenham 174; RSC 33b.

Ex. RBW collection, Ex. Malter XXX(Frederick H. Rindge collection) lot 1473, 6/7/1985



Anyone else got any anonymous quinarii to share? I'd love to see them!

 

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Wow, the provenance just keeps getting better and is apparently much older than I originally realized(only just now doing research because it wasn't listed by the auction house). The Rindge Collection was the collection of Frederick H. Rindge, 1857-1905. Rindge was a member of multiple historical societies and during his lifetime he amassed such a collection that he loaned out coins for exhibition at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, Harvard College and the Peabody Museum.

Google also turned up a picture:

 

Excellent coin with a great provenance.

 

This one is also a Joel L. Marter coin, purchased by them in 1975. I still don't know if it lists who owned it before, like yours. I have't received it yet, but I've been told it comes with the ticket similar to yours. Maybe it came from the same collection?




This one was minted only a few months after the end of the Third Punic War, around the time the veterans would have been getting home and settling in. Although people don't know why the wild ass is behind Roma, I'd like to think it's a pun against the Carthaginians, because as you know Carthage was symbolized by a horse, and here is this silly wild ass right behind Roma, almost in a comedic fashion, appearing on a Roman denarii just shortly after the completion of the Third Punic War.

Anyway, I will take a picture of the ticket when I get it. Wouldn't it be something if it all came out of the same collection originally, yours and mine? We already share Joel L. Marter in common for both, if we also shared the previous owner that would be mind blowing. I will update this as soon as I get the coin.

 

That is a really nice denarius, but I doubt it's from the Rindge collection(though it may still have equally old provenance). I think the Rindge collection sales were all in 1985 or at least thereabouts. Yours was probably one of Malter's mail bid sales or possibly a retail sale. He was a pretty big dealer at the time and sold quite a few coins and I've actually got another denarius sold by Malter in 1970 as well but with no further provenance.

 

I see...well, I hope I still get more provenance than just 1975. Crossing my fingers.

So far my coins don't have much provenance. My Trajan Denarii can only be traced back to 2012, most of my coins are traced to the collection of John Anthony circa 2015...and as good as having a JA provenance might be, it just doesn't go very far. I am so exited to be getting one traced to 1975, and I'm hoping it can be traced back a lot further.

PS: It's amazing that our coins are 70+ years apart but have the same motifs. I see Republicans were a stickler for traditional imagery in coinage.

 

I highly recommend checking out CNG's archives. You can find their old catalogs here: http://issuu.com/cngcoins/ . I recently purchased a bronze sextans from the Andrew McCabe collection. I contacted him and he mentioned that he bought it from RBW in 2009 but had no further provenance. Checking my old CNG catalogs, I found that it was from the Goodman collection(a.k.a. Richard Schaefer) sold at CNG 45 in 1996. Have not found anything older, but that was a nice find since it means that it passed through 3 amazing Republican bronze collections over the years. If you ever have a chance to get a bunch of pre-Internet catalogs for free or cheap, jump all over that. They are very helpful for finding old provenance sometimes, although plenty of coins have been off the market for 40 or 50 years and never photographed until some dealer or auctioneer puts them online.

 

A scarce H variety, also ex RBW, with H behind rather than below the horses:

 

A very rare dolabella quinarius:


and a rare ROMA monogram:

 

Oh my...almost looks fresh off the mint. Looking at it its not hard to imagine a Roman soldier in the 2nd century receiving one just like this one as part of his pay prior to going on campaign, or perhaps just as he got back home. Beautiful coin.

 

Beautiful coin, spork - I'm glad it arrived safe and sound!

 

Stunningly beautiful coins guys!!!

Here's a quinarius (EDIT:actually a Victoriatus LOL) I posted a few weeks ago that was later confirmed to be after the end of the Hannibalic War, but obviously not of the Dioscuri, although I do have a Denarius of that type----and a 'Lentulus' quinarius.....

 

Congrats Red, it's a keeper!

 

Thanks. I'm happy and relieved as well. Its arrival was really strange. I was actually waiting on another package this morning and when I got a USPS tracking email that read "Arrived at post office" in my to

That's actually a victoriatus(3/4 denarius versus quinarius worth 1/2 denarius). But a really cool coin nonetheless, and a denomination that I still don't own unfortunately.

 

Yes, you are absolutely correct---I mis-labeled a Quinarius (Lentulus) I just purchased with it as I was rearranging my photos...OOPS LOL...

 

awesome coin RS, it would have been a shape if that one would have went MIA. Cool you found a picture of one of the cats that owned the coin over a hundred years ago!

 

I like 'em all ... *edit*

 

Well, I might as well post my modest non-anonymous 'Lentulus quinarius'. It's not much to look at, but it is ancient and a quinarius.... and it cost me only about $20.00 shipped.

Lentulus AR quinarius, 88 BC; Clodianus, Victory and trophy:

 

Spork - neat coin and nice to see the provenance. That looks like RBW's handwriting on the envelope. I've got a bunch of his catalogues with notes from his library. I've got one of the CNG Goodman sales with all of his notes as well. Pretty neat.

Here's mine:

 

A wonderful addition RS!! What an incredible amount of time for a domestic package to arrive, I'm glad it arrived safe and sound.