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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;zumbly, post: 3262173, member: 57495&quot;]Welcome to <a href="https://www.cointalk.com/threads/ancients-the-headless-medusa-club.244466/" class="internalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://www.cointalk.com/threads/ancients-the-headless-medusa-club.244466/">The Headless Medusa Club</a>! I think we&#039;ve yet to see a perfect one of these and yours is actually not half bad, with only thing missing on the reverse being the harpa. My first one was missing most of the body and all of the neck-stump. <img src="styles/default/xenforo/clear.png" class="mceSmilieSprite mceSmilie80" alt=":shame:" unselectable="on" unselectable="on" /></p><p><br /></p><p>I often (usually?) buy coins for their reverses.&nbsp; For me, that&#039;s often where the story is at, quite literally. </p><p><br /></p><p>I bought this one about five years ago, and at the time, it was the most expensive coin I had bought by a factor of about 5. The reverse depicts a scene from Virgil&#039;s <i>Aeneid</i>, where, in a prophetic dream, Aeneas, while leading a group of refugees fleeing Troy, encounters the river god Tiberinus when he reaches Italy.&nbsp; The god tells him he should settle his people when he sees a white sow suckling her young under an oak tree. He sees this very omen the next day along the river, and builds his town on the spot that would in the future become the city of Rome.</p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]858242[/ATTACH]<b>ANTONINUS PIUS</b></p><p>AE As. 11.02g, 28.6mm. Rome mint, AD 140-144. RIC 733; Cohen 450. O: ANTONINVS AVG PIVS P P TR P COS III, laureate head right. R: IMPERATOR II, sow seated by a river under a oak tree suckling three piglets, with another one in front of her; SC in exergue.</p><p><i>Ex Old Sable Collection</i></p><p><i><br /></i></p><p>Provincials often have great story reverses.&nbsp; This rare bronze from Tyre I picked up earlier this year also really made me &quot;splash the cash&quot;.&nbsp; It shows the founding the Greek city of Thebes by Cadmus.&nbsp; Cadmus was son of the king of Tyre and brother of Europa.&nbsp; Europa had been abducted by Zeus, and on his travels in search of his sister, Cadmus found himself in Greece, where he taught the Greeks the alphabet and writing, and also founded the city of Thebes.</p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]858244[/ATTACH]</p><p><b>VALERIAN</b></p><p>Rare. AE27. 13.98g, 27.3mm. PHOENICIA, Tyre, circa AD 253-260. Rouvier 2500. O: IMP C P LIC VALERIANVS AVG, laureate, draped, and cuirassed bust right. R: TVRIORVM, Cadmus standing left, holding patera and spear; at feet to left, cow reclining right; in left field, city gate of Thebes above ΘH/BЄ; murex shell to right.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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