I have collected late Roman AE for decades. I just bought three coins of 388-392 and saw they had a detail described in a different way. Here is the usual way: Arcadius 14 mm. 12:00. 1.02 grams RIC Antioch 67d2 Victory advancing left, holding trophy on shoulder with right hand and dragging captive with left. cross-rho in field left. mm: ANTΓ RIC Antioch 67d2 The following coins are small, 14 mm. Here is a closeup. Look above the Victory's left shoulder (on the right). What do you see? That one is a coin of Theodosius from Cyzicus, SMKB. Here is another, and then one of Valentinian II: SMKA Okay, now you have seen three examples from Cyzicus. The previous owner, who cared a great deal about early Christian symbols on coins, thought that was the hand of God reaching down and touching Victory on the shoulder. I don't recall any book or article which described that detail that way. Do you? On the first, usual, coin you can see in the right hand of Victory the pole of the trophy, the bulk of which is at 12:30, over her shoulder. On my three Cycicus coins her right hand is up, in much the same position, but I see no pole and I do see something that might be interpreted as a hand reaching down. The hand, if that's what it is, is only 2 mm long which may excuse the lack of detail. We know that AE2 coins of Arcadius from 383-388 had a "hand of God" crowning Arcadius on the obverse: So the idea of a "hand of "God" was around when the coins were minted. I am trying not to bias the interpretation. Do you think the three coins from Cyzicus I showed have a trophy or a hand of God (or something else)?
Neat reverse. I am dubious of the "hand" interpretation in this particular case, but y'all are the experts and I'm only a part-time dabbler in ancients, so I will defer to those with more experience (which is practically everyone here). Speaking of one's eye seeing things in Victory's wings, here is my old "Space Shuttle" Nero dupondius. See the space shuttle there, blasting off behind her? Seriously, though, what's going on there? What's that "barb" that protrudes from above the top portion of the wing? I dunno. Nor do I know what's going on with your Victory's wing, but I can certainly see why some might interpret it as a "Hand of God" motif. With that attractive patina framing it so nicely on the second coin in the OP, it really does look like a hand. I personally have my doubts on that score, however. Interesting topic either way.
It is a palm. It is amazing what we see if we look at enough coins. Unfortunately, it is also amazing what we imagine if we want to see something. I am currently chasing my own details of question that others don't see. I remember when Tory Failmezger was trying to convince others he saw stirrups on falling horsemen. I will need to see more specimens of this coin to decide whether it is what we see or what we want.
The fact that they are all from the same mint and thus likely the work of the same celator is significant. Victory has two wings. It's possible that the celator was trying to show the tip of the second wing. (Notice the border of dots along the edge of the left wing.) It's also possible that your interpretation is correct, but I would think that someone trying to show the hand of God would have made it more obvious, especially for these devout emperors. God was not very subtle back then.
I think the catalogue description is correct. Looking at a variety of this issue at all mints, I see all sorts of bizarre shapes, a few of which are hand-ish. But earlier examples of the theme clearly have a trophy, e.g.: I think the "fingers" on your example are simply the pteruges (leather strips) hanging from the cuirass of the trophy, clearly visible on this Constantine. Since the traditional iconography makes sense, in my opinion that's a much more plausible explanation than a hand of God.
