Featured Follow the coin theme GAME - ancient edition - post ‘em if you got ‘em

This Spanish imitation semis is in the mail on its way to me, but I'll post it!



Next: More Saturn!!!

 

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Anonymous, Cast Semis, Rome, ca. 225-217 BC
AE (g 123; mm 51; h 12)
Laureate head of Saturn l.; below, S, Rv. Prow r.; above, S. Crawford 35/2; ICC 76.
Untouched green patina and about extremely fine.

next , more Saturn...

 

I LOVE EVERYTHING about that coin

Next: more Saturn

 

next: more Saturn

 

Next: Jupiter

 

Since it's the Coin theme game, not the Astronomy game, here's an actual coin with Saturn to satisfy @Andres2's prompt:

Roman Republic, M. Nonius Sufenas*, AR Denarius, 59 BCE (or 57 BCE according to Hersh and Walker & Harlan), Rome Mint. Obv. Bearded head of Saturn right, with long hair; behind head, harpa with conical stone (baetyl)** beneath it* and S•C upwards above it; before, SVFENAS downwards / Rev. Roma seated left on pile of shields, holding scepter in right hand and sword in left hand; behind, Victory left, crowning Roma with wreath and holding palm-branch extending behind her over right shoulder; around to left from 4:00, PR•L• - V• - P•F; in exergue, SEX•NONI [The two parts of the reverse legend, together, stand for Sex. Noni[us] pr[aetor] L[udi] V[ictoriae] p[rimus] f[ecit, meaning Sex. Nonius, praetor, first held the games of Victory.].*** Crawford 421/1, RSC Nonia1(ill.), BMCRR 3820, Sear RCV I 377 (ill.), Sydenham 885, Harlan, RRM II Ch. 13 at pp. 104-111[Harlan, Michael, Roman Republican Moneyers and their Coins 63 BCE - 49 BCE (2d ed. 2015)], RBW Collection 1517. 19 mm., 3.95 g.


*”The moneyer is doubtless M. Nonius Sufenas, Pr. 55.” Crawford Vol. I p. 445. But see Liv Mariah Yarrow, The Roman Republic to 49 BCE: Using Coins as Sources (2021), Fig. 3.53 at p. 158, suggesting that in the alternative, the moneyer was “perhaps his son.” M. Nonius Sufenas’s “father, Sextus Nonius Sufenas, was Sulla’s nephew, making the moneyer Faustus’ first cousin once removed.” Id. (Faustus was Sulla’s son.) See also Harlan RRM II at pp. 109-110.

After his term as moneyer, Nonius Sufenas is mentioned in one of Cicero’s letters to Atticus in July 54 BCE: “Now for the news at Rome. On the fourth of July, Sufenas and Cato were acquitted, Procilius condemned. Clearly our stern judges care not one whit about bribery, the elections, the interregnum, treason, or the whole Republic. Cicero, Ad Atticum, 4.15.4; see Harlan RRM II at pp. 104-106 for a proposed identification of the election which was the subject of the prosecution, namely the consular election of 56 BCE.

** See Harlan RRM II at p. 107: "The head of Saturn clearly identified by the harpa and the conical stone beside his head is on the obverse of the coin. The harpa recalls the castration of his father Uranus that resulted in the birth of Venus and the conical stone recalls that Saturn swallowed a stone thinking it was his infant son Jupiter whom he was trying to keep from growing up to replace him.
Saturn, always identified by the harpa, appeared five times on Republican denarii." Harlan suggests (id. pp. 107-108) that, as on other coins on which Saturn appears, his image was intended to signal the moneyer’s past or present position holding office as urban quaestor, and, as such, “responsible for the treasury located in Saturn’s temple.”

***This reverse legend, as illustrated by the reverse image, “records the first celebration by an ancestor of the moneyer of the Ludi Victoriae of Sulla.” Crawford Vol. I pp. 445-446. (That ancestor was the aforementioned Sextus Nonius Sufenas, Pr. 81 BCE, the moneyer’s father [or grandfather] and Sulla’s nephew.)

Next, a coin with Jupiter.

 

Ah, my turn...

 

Sorry, I just had to.
To keep everyone happy here's Jupiter from Luceria:

Next: Mars?

 

Next, as I said, is a coin with Jupiter. This is a serious game, dammit! (Edited to add: the game may be serious, but I hope you understand that I'm not!)

 

My bad. It's actually Jupiter on the victoriatus, not Saturn. I've corrected it.

Isn't that a contradiction? Games are supposed to be fun...

So, next Mars?

 

Here are both -- take your choice...
Jupiter, denarius of civil war 69 CE.

and RR denarius of Cn. Lentulus , 88 BCE.

next.... Venus.

 

And Mars... (see above)

 

Faustina II, AD 147-175.
Roman AR denarius, 2.64 g, 17.4 mm, 7 h.
Rome, early AD 148-March AD 149.
Obv: FAVSTINAE AVG PII AVG FIL, draped bust, right, with band of pearls round head.
Rev: VENVS, Venus, standing left, holding apple and rudder, around which a dolphin is entwined.
Refs: RIC 517c; BMCRE 1067-73; RSC 266a; Strack 495; RCV 4708; CRE 233.

Next: Mercury

 

RR. Aes Grave , sextans with Mercury / prow reverse.

next... Minerva.

 

Hi All,



Reference: RIC IV, pt 1, 007 (R1)
Note: RIC incorrectly lists this type with obverse (b) D CL SEPT ALBIN CAES where the plated coin on pl II, 11 shows the correct obverse (a) legend as on this coin.

Next: A countermarked coin

- Broucheion

 

Domitian, Roman Empire
(later revalued in the Ostrogothic Kingdom of Italy)
AE As / 42 nummi
Obv: CAESAR AVG F DOMITIAN COS II, laureate head left, countermark XLII (42) in left field
Rev: VICTORIA AVGVST, Victory advancing right, standing on prow, holding wreath and palm branch, S-C across fields
Mint: Rome
Date: 73-74 AD (struck); 498-526 AD (revalued)
Ref: RIC 677



Next: left-facing Domitian

 

next: Titus Antioch mint

 

12 hrs
A lifetime issue of Faustina Sr, the dealer didn't mention this, but I assumed it would be one!

Next, when your assumption was right.

 

I always assumed my Corinth Stater was from an old collection and I would find a prior provenance someday. Bought in 1991 (or thereabouts). In 2021 I finally noticed it illustrated in the Naville catalog of the 1921 Pozzi Sale.

Where was it for the 70 intervening years? How did it get from Lucerne, 1921, to Tucson, 1991?? WHERE? WHO? HOW? It drives me crazy....





NEXT: A coin about which you have questions you can't shake...

 

I think this is from around the time of Nero... but that is only based on similar victories on globes.
Could be from before him or even after the turds hit the fan:

Next: rare coin in your favorite areas of study