EtTu

There were a couple coins on my radar from the recent Portuscalle Numismatica auction, unfortunately I was on 12 hour nights that week and the auction was right in the middle of when I needed to sleep. I guesstimated the time my coins would come up and set my alarm for 1/2 hour before that. I won the coin I was most interested in, and then opted not to bid further as I paid a hefty pierce for the Gallienus zoo coin I had won. I continued to watch with my phone in my hand and my thumb hovering over the screen and I must have fallen asleep and accidentally bid because I saw this coin in my won lots on biddr...

At least it was only a 30 EUR coin...

This Gallienus Griffin was the one I really wanted! Yes, I already have a seated griffin, but this one was just such an unusual style I had to have it. It has feathers all around its head and it appears to have talons on its front feet instead of the lion paws you normally see on Gallienus coinage. 

Since we cast delete posts, I deleted the content so there wasn't two identical posts. One of my comments recently was duplicated as well, does anyone know why this happens? 

Gallienus Griffin

Gallienus Goat

Gallienus Gazelle

➡️  Nemean lion, before he was skinned...

Gallienus 253-268 AD

Obv: GALLIENVS AVG, radiate bust right

Rev: HERCVLI CONS AVG, lion walking left, A in exergue

Ref: Mir 709 (A), Wolkow 15a1

➡️  Nemean lion, before he was skinned...

Gallienus 253-268 AD

Obv: GALLIENVS AVG, radiate bust right

Rev: HERCVLI CONS AVG, lion walking left, A in exergue

Ref: Mir 709 (A), Wolkow 15a1

I'm trying to get my collection photographed and organized properly. I would like to have a resource where I can go to see and search my collection online. I know there's galleries like on Forvm Ancient Coins and I know of Colleconline. I'm just wondering if anyone else uses something similar and what you use. Thanks! 

@shanxi All the references I've seen identify it as a stork, so I just went with it. 🤷‍♀️

A few of my birds: 

Gallienus Stork

Itty bitty bird you can just see under the bow on the reverse. Ex BCD coin from Lamia.

Sikyonia Dove

And to change things up a little bit, a Roman zoomorphic brooch. Unfortunately, the pin appears to be modern.

Ebay got me into the hobby. I was on there searching something completely unrelated when this coin was suggested to me.

Not very pretty, but I couldn't believe a piece of ancient history could be had for around $10USD shipped. I bid on it and won. It came from Romae Aeternae, who I found out after the fact does sell genuine, if overpriced on BIN, coins. I've been collecting gallienus zoo coins ever since, abs have found quite a few gems on ebay. It helps that my niche is so hyperfocused so I'm not wading through thousands upon thousands of coins. 

@Roman Collector In my 3 years of collecting, Gallienus zoo coin prices have skyrocketed, but some of these sellers are just out of their mind with their pricing!

On a side note, that verdigris is definitely worth it's price!

Mispelled reverse, should be NEPTVNO not NAEPTVUNO. Possibly a fraudulent coin.

Mintmark is inverted, should be XI not IX.

Spelling on reverse is SAECULARHS AVG. Some resources give this spelling and others give SAECULARES AVG.

38 minutes ago, Curtis JJ said:

@Nerosmyfavorite68 --  @Orange Julius 

"Coryssa The world's largest ancient coin database hosting over 2 million coins." https://www.coryssa.org/index.php Takes a little practice, but it's a great tool for indexing ebay sales, etc., that could otherwise be lost for research purposes.

https://dirtyoldcoins.com/research

@Curtis JJ What a great resource!!! Ive been searching for a picture of a coin I won on ebay early on in my collecting and never received. It was shipped and made it to the states, but then has been lost in USPS limbo. I was at the time using a PO box that I no longer have so there's no chance of it ever showing up in my mailbox. When I searched Gallienus, it was on the very first page!

Thanks everyone for verifying that it's not just my copy. As I mainly collect Gallienus coins that was the first section I opened up to and was really bummed to find it was missing 42 coins. I have since downloaded the 3rd century section of the book from dirty old coins and that version has the missing coins in it. 

On 8/12/2022 at 2:04 PM, singig said:

Thanks @DonnaML for reopen this interesting discution here , I have followed also the one on CT.

I have a griffin with a supplementary wing , something like a pelvic fin for a fish ,  I didn't find any other similar griffin .

I'm not sure what the engraver wanted to represent ?

 

Gallienus, AE antoninianus, Rome mint. RIC V 165

IMP GALLIENVS AVG, radiate head right /

APOLLINI CONS AVG, gryphon walking left. Officina letter Δ in exergue

That is pretty interesting. I once saw a Gallienus panther coin that almost looked like it had a wing, probably from a break in the die or something. Yours definitely looks intentional.

I have a whole subset of my collection devoted to zoo coins that are unique, quirky, or just interesting. (In my opinion, anyways, because my collection, my rules!)

This one is a little overexposed, but here is a two headed panther/tiger.

And a no headed panther.

A DIANAE coin with some kind of metal tag soldered? Onto it. I have seen another coin with a similar tag, but I forget where.

Here's a coin that some ancient citizen liked enough to turn it into a pendant.

This one just had an appealing shape to me.

A barbarous imitation.

While not the most interesting, this coin has a stag with such a large head and ear, it almost looks more like a moose.

@DonnaML Thank you! I don't have the Apollini lioness, the rearing/galloping with raised bow centaur, right facing panther, left facing bull, and the right facing antelope with the gamma mintmark. 

Here's two of my favorite Pegasi, I just love the styling on these coins. The first was possibly double struck as the pegasus had a mintmark on his flank. 

A nicely detailed and silvered panther/tigress, I'd say tigress based on the striping. 

Two of my favorite hippocampi. The first is one I recently found on ma-shops for just $15 USD, the picture wasn't very good but I thought it looked like it had good detail. I was very surprised by just how nice it was when I got it in hand. Pictures don't do it justice. It's nicely silvered and has excellent detail. I just love how on both coins the hippocampi's mane goes to their elbow.

A double struck centaur 

A hippocamp with an unusual mintmark, ot should be N.

A hippocamp with a spelling error on the reverse NAEPTVUNO. Possibly a fraudulent coin.

An imitation coin purchased from Wolkow

The Gallienus zoo series is my main collecting focus, I have around 100 coins that belong to the series. 

This was my purchase from the last Leu auction, a criocamp to upgrade the existing one in my collection. 

My original criocamp

These two coins came from the same lot on CNG and are two of the hardest to find coins from the zoo series. They aren't in the greatest condition, but I also never thought I'd get them. They also averaged out to be some of the least expensive of my coins as no one really bid against me, I don't even think even think it hit the estimate. 

Herculean lion

Right facing Gryphon 

Two more of the rarer coins from his series that also came in CNG lots. They were from the same auction as above abs again I don't think any of the 3 zoo group lots I purchased from that auction hit the estimate so lucked out on all of them.

Left facing hippocamp

Left facing pegasus

Another left facing pegasus I found on ebay. It's overcleaned, but was only $30 USD so well worth it in my opinion. The reverse is also a die match for a coin sold by Wolkow.

And another coin I never thought I'd own, the seated griffin. It has nice detail and silvering and is overall much nicer in hand than the photo shows. 

I have two Herculean boars, the first is amongst my favorites of my collection.

This isn't the nicest bull I own, but it's interesting because the mint mark is IX instead of XI.

This coin is the IVNONI bearded elk that is associated with Salonina's coinage. There are however some examples like mine that have a Gallienus obverse. 

Two capricorns

In my copy of ERIC II the pages 533 and 534 are exactly the same. I was wondering if it's just an error in just my book or every copy. If anyone else has that book, would you mind checking and letting me know? 

I don't have any coins with Neptune on them, however I do have coins invoking his protection...

While I love collecting my Gallienus zoo coins, and have even tried getting rid of some of my BCD coins that don't exactly fit my collection, I have decided I really love tiny coins as well. I don't know much about this coin, it was very much an impulse buy, but I immediately fell in love with the tiny size and simplicity of it. 

Caria 5th Century B.C., Silverobol, Apparently unpublished in references.

obverse: forepart of bull charging left; reverse: head of gazelle left

6.7mm, 0.394g

This coin was labeled as an IOVI CONS AVG Gallienus goat coin. It's actually IVNONI CONS AVG with a bearded elk. It is normally found on Salonina's coinage, however there are some examples, like mine, with a Gallienus obverse.

Next: A coin with royal/ presidential/ or otherwise famous provenance. 

I should note, I'm on android so it may be different from you if you're on ios or desktop. But I went to my profile and clicked this button here:

Then in almost the almost the same spot a drop down menu called 'content type' appears. It's in that menu.

46 minutes ago, shanxi said:

No it's not the same.

 

See my "Gallery". I only uploaded one picture to the gallery, to test it:

https://www.numisforums.com/profile/149-shanxi/content/?type=gallery_image&change_section=1

 

and believe me, I have postet much more pictures 😁

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

My bad, when I went to look for mine it just showed me images I commented, but now I see the drop down menu where I can choose my gallery. 

51 minutes ago, shanxi said:

It's already there but hidden. Just randomly I selected the gallery of Paddy54:

 

https://www.numisforums.com/profile/25-paddy54/content/?type=gallery_image&change_section=1

 

You have to access the gallery via "all activity" in the respective profile.

But that's just a gallery of images and albums you've posted to the forums. So in order to add anything in your gallery, you have to make a post about it. 

Barbarous Gallienus imitating Dianae gazelle or antelope. Purchased directly from Cédric Wolkow. 

Next: A coin with at least 3 different kinds of creatures, real and/or mythical.