This coin is not particularly rare, it is not in good condition, it's just a small bronze coin almost 1900 years old... Gaza, Hadrian (117-138), AE as, 24 mm, 12.01 g. Gaza, AD 130/1. Obv.: ΑΥΤ ΚΑΙ ΤΡΑΙ ΑΔΡΙΑΝΟϹ ϹE, laureate and draped head of Hadrian, r. (seen from rear) Rev.: ΓΑΖΑ ·Β·ΕΠΙ, Tyche standing l. with sceptre and cornucopia; behind, heifer; to r., aramaic mem RPC III 4020. The obverse legend means "Imperator Caesar Trajanus Hadrianus Augustus". The reverse legend means "Gaza, year 2 of the Epidemia" that is "of the imperial stay". The aramaic letter mem is sometimes called the "Gaza symbol" because it is on almost every reverse of a coin issued by Gaza since the Seleucid rule, and it was already found on many silver Athenian style fractions minted there in the 4th c. BC under Persian rule. Some consider it is the first letter of "Marnas" ("Our Lord"), the Zeus of Gaza, but that's not certain because Gaza's main deity in Hellenistic times was Apollo and the name "Marnas" is never mentioned before Hadrian. The reverse represents the statue of the Tyche of Gaza, for Stephanus of Byzantium wrote "Gaza is called Ione because of Io, and she has a cow next to her statue". This coin was minted just the year following a great moment in the city's history: the visit of the emperor! We know that Hadrian did not always stay in his Roman palace but liked to travel in all provinces to meet in person the legions and the local urban elites, from northern Britain (where he ordered the building of the famous Hadrian's Wall) to Greece, Syria, Arabia, Egypt, North Africa. In Syria he had crossed the steppe and visited Palmyra; in Arabia in 129/130 he had visited Gerasa (Jerash), Philadelphia (Amman) and Petra. He never entered a city empty handed, offering tax debts pardons or sometimes establishing new institutions. After his visit to Petra, which like Palmyra was renamed after himself Hadriana Petra, he crossed the desert by the old caravan route and arrived in Gaza, probably in the summer of 129. We do not know how long he stayed there. Celebrations were organized. A rhetor probably pronounced in Greek an official panegyrical speech in praise of the emperor and of the city of Gaza, telling the city's rich mythological history: Azon, Heracles' son, naming the city after himself; Zeus founding it and depositing his treasure there (treasure is "gaza" in Greek); Io, changed by Zeus into a heifer, finding shelter in Gaza and staying some time before going to Egypt; Minos king of Crete and his brothers Rhadamanthus and Aeacus having been here too. Special games were organized and called Hadrianic Games, to be held in Gaza on a regular basis for at least two centuries. A new era was established, the Epidemia era. A new monetary privilege was also granted to the city mint. Before this visit, Gaza, which had sometimes minted silver coins in the past under the Achemenids and the Ptolemies, bronze coins under the Seleucids and her short-lived liberty, had minted very few coins under Roman rule since her liberation by Pompey. There had been only an emission of as, semis and quadrans under Augustus in AD 5/6 and another one of as and semis under Vespasian in 69/70. When Hadrian came in 129, the city had not been minting any coin for 60 years. After the emperor left, Gaza started minting a whole set of 5 bronze coins, like Rome : quadrans, semis, as, dupondius and sestertius. The obverse dies were carved in delicate hellenistic style (or were they imported from Alexandria or Rome?). The reverse types representing Io welcomed by the personification of Gaza, Heracles or Minos, illustrate the local mythology. Minting started in 130/131 and was continued each year under Hadrian and Antoninus Pius, but the set was later reduced to 4 or 3 denominations, no longer issued every year. Gaza's remarkably productive mint was closed under Gordian III after a last emission in 241/242. Gaza has had a rich history since. Some superstars of history came there, Umar al-Khattab the companion of Muhammad and future caliph, Richard Coeur de Lion king of England, the French general Bonaparte... The city has been a battleground more than once, especially in 1917 when it was largely destroyed by artillery. After 1948 it became a monstrous refugee camp for the population expelled from Palestine. Presently it is being turned into rubble and they are already talking of expelling again the surviving population, this time to the desert...
