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I suppose the bes was an unpopular denomination, as it was minted just once, in 126 BC. Gens: Cassia Moneyer: C. Cassius Longinus Coin: Bronze Bes S : - Head of Liber right, wearing ivy-wreath C.CASSI / S : / ROMA - Prow of galley right Mint: Rome (126 BC) Wt./Size/Axis: 11.12g / 23mm / 1h References: Sydenham 504 Crawford 266/3 Acquisition: Christoph Kistenich Facebook 15-Jul-2021 Next - some other unusual denomination.

Spontaneous trips and detours are the best 🙂 ATB, Aidan.

Cr. 463/3 denarius. Here's my example - https://www.tantaluscoins.com/coins/42066.php ATB, Aidan.

Back in June I posted a My Bloody Valentine song in this thread. A short time later, Hot Press magazine published a "50 Greatest Irish Albums" list and put MBV's Loveless at number 1. According to Wikipedia - Loveless - was expected by MBV's record company to take 5 days to record, but actually took two years, finally appearing in November 1991. Their next album appeared in 2013 and a fourth album was expected around 2017, but is still in the works - something like RIC Vol. II.2. The main guy behind their (infamously loud live) sound is Kevin Shields - I found this interview with him - this is part 1. "... how many Jazzmaster guitars do you have?... 10, 12, 11 or 12, there's more, there's more.... maybe 25, but 12 good ones... I need more, I do!": So, I listened to Loveless again and it's got into my head - I hope to see them someday... Here's a coin from a recent Elsen auction - no connection to the music. Gens: Neria Moneyer: Cn. Nerius Coin: Silver Denarius N͡ERI·Q·V͡RB - Head of Saturn, right, with harpa over shoulder L·LEN͡T C·M͡ARC CO S - Legionary eagle; on left, standard of maniple of hastati; on right, standard of maniple of principes Mint: Rome (49 BC) Wt./Size/Axis: 4.03g / - / - References: RSC 1 (Neria) Sydenham 937 Crawford 441/1 HCRI 2 Acquisition: Jean Elsen Online auction Auction 156 #448 16-Sep-2023 ATB, Aidan.

Here's the younger Faustina. Ruler: Faustina II (Augusta) Coin: Brass Sestertius DIVAE FAVSTINAE PIAE - Draped bust right, veiled MATRI CASTRORVM S C - Faustina seated left, holding globe surmounted by phoenix and sceptre; before her, three standards Mint: Rome Wt./Size/Axis: 24.30g / 31mm / 0h Rarity: R2 References: RIC 1711 (M. Aurelius) Cohen 162 Acquisition: Paco Private sale 25-Aug-2010 Next - sestertius

I like the depth of reverse on this medal. Issued By: Vatican Type: Commemorative Details: Pope Pius IX | PIVS IX PONT MAX AN XXVIII - Draped bust left BASIL S LAVRENTII M REST ET ORN - Interior of Basilica of San Lorenzo outside the walls Grouping: Single Designer: Giuseppe Bianchi Shape: Round. Mint: (1873) Wt./Size/Axis: 34.03g / 43.6mm / - References: Modesti 340 Acquisition: Artemide Aste Online Auction Asta 24.2E #1970 20-Oct-2013 Next - silver medal

Eagle on thunderbolt... Ruler: Ptolemy I State, City: Egypt, Alexandria Coin: Gold Triobol - Diademed head of Ptolemy I right, lion skin tied around neck ΠΤΟΛΕΜΑΥΟΥ ΒΑΣΙΛΕΩΥ - Eagle standing left on thunderbolt with spread wings; in left field, MI ligate Mint: Alexandria (ca 305-282 BC) Wt./Size/Axis: 1.75g / 10mm / 2h References: BMC 48 Svoronos 200 SNG Berry 1466 Acquisition: Roma Numismatics Online Auction E-Auction 2 #302 2-Nov-2013 Next - ancient gold coin

A few coins from Jacquier arrived yesterday - I didn't find them until today as the postman put the packet under the mat. He had turned the mat upside down, but I didn't notice that last night! Anyway, the coins are all nicely toned and better than the sales photos. Here's one. Cr. 533/2, 3.74g. Mark Antony. 37BC, South Italy mint. I'm on my 'phone so will just pull the CRRO description. Obverse Legend: M·ANTONIVS·M·F·M·N·AVGVR·IM͡P·TER͡T Type: M. Antonius standing right, togate and wearing veil, holding lituus in right hand. Border of dots. Portrait: Mark Antony State: Roman Republic Reverse Legend: III·VIR·R·P·C·COS·DESIG·ITER·ET·TERT Type: Radiate head of Sol, right. Border of dots. Deity: Sol ATB, Aidan.

Region, Tribe: Gaul, Ambiani Coin: Gold Stater - Blank - Sinuous horse right, long spurs on horse's hindlegs Mint: (ca 58-55 BC) Wt./Size/Axis: 6.11g / 16mm / - References: ABC 16 var VA 52 LT 8710 var Sills class 2a Provenances: Linda Banfield collection Acquisition: Chris Rudd Online 8-Apr-2013 Next - another Celtic coin.

Here's a modern Irish €50 gold coin, just a NCLT. Next: ancient gold.

Here are a couple of my favourite Athenas. Seated - reverse of a Lysimachos tetradrachm (Thrace, Lysimacheia), HGC 3, part 2, 1493 (this coin illustrated): And a New Type tetradrachm - NSSCA, 66 b pl. 9 which is badly struck but has a decent portrait which could do with a new photo': ATB, Aidan.

Here's an Athens tetradrachm. State, City: Attica, Athens Coin: Silver Tetradrachm - Helmeted head of Athena right, with frontal eye ΑΘΕ - Owl standing right, head facing; olive sprig and crescent behind; all within incuse square Mint: Athens (ca 454-404 BC) Wt./Size/Axis: 17.18g / 23mm / 5h References: Kroll 8 SNG Cop. 31 Acquisition: CNG Online auction eAuction 333 #45 20-Aug-2014 Next - a Greek silver coin not from Athens.

Once again, I've spent the evening trapped in YouTube 🙂 It started with the Manics and Nina Hoss, but ended up with The Waterboys. I posted this song on CoinTalk a few years back, but this is a different live version - "Long Strange Golden Road". One of my favourite Waterboys songs since the 1980s (meaning that this is, for me, one of the best songs Mike Scott has written since the 1980s - it's fairly recent). "She was Aphrodite, Helen, Thetis, Eve among the satyrs She was Venus in a v-neck sweater She was all that ever mattered" I suppose Venus could be wearing a V-neck sweater here... Gens: Considia Moneyer: C. Considius Nonianus Coin: Silver Denarius C•CONSIDI•NONIANI / S•C - Laureate and diademed bust of Venus right ERVC - Temple on summit of rocky mountain surrounded by wall with towers on each side and gate in centre Mint: Rome (57 BC) Wt./Size/Axis: 3.92g / 19mm / 6h References: RSC 1a (Considia) Sydenham 887 Crawford 424/1 Provenances: Ex. Bernard Poindessault (1935-2014) Collection Acquisition: Roma Numismatics Online Auction E-Live Auction 1 #508 25-Jul-2018 ATB, Aidan.

I suppose it is arguable that Quirinus is the same as Romulus (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quirinus) and he is depicted on Cr. 427/2. Gens: Memmia Moneyer: C. Memmius C.f. Coin: Silver Denarius QVIRINVS / C·MEMMI·C·F - Laureate head of Quirinus right MEMMIVS· AED·CERIALIA·PREIMVS·FECIT - Ceres seated right, holding torch in left hand and corn-ears in right hand; before, snake Mint: Rome (56 BC) Wt./Size/Axis: 3.95g / - / - References: RSC 9 (Memmia) Sydenham 921 Crawford 427/2 RBW 1532 BMCRR Rome 3940 Acquisition: Numismatica Ars Classica Online Auction Auction 114 Part I #462 7-May-2019 ATB, Aidan.

The portrait of Gallienus is very nice. ATB, Aidan.

Wow! - I love it, Phil. ATB, Aidan.

The good news is that the Tantalus website is back online - hopefully it will stay up this time. I've downloaded my data "Just in case" as I do want to do my own database and automating parsing the spreadsheet view into this will be a nice task. I added this coin tonight - another that was waiting for me last week. Cr. 100/5 - Canusium sextans of 209-208 BC. 5.08g, 19mm. Here's another from the same auction - Cr. 41/9 - this is overstruck on something, but I'm not sure what - anyone hazard a guess? Ca. 215-212 BC, 16.78g, 27mm. ATB, Aidan.

Actually, that's a much scarcer coin than the BARBAT you mention - it's Cr. 517/8 and the obverse legend is: M·ANT·IM͡P·A͡VG·III·VIR·R·P·C·L·GELL·Q·P CRRO link ATB, Aidan.

I took 3 weeks off as we finished a long-running project and I needed a break. I had no idea what to do but finally decided to go to Spain and walk some of the Camino de Santiago. I booked a flight to Madrid and back from Santiago and went the following morning. One night in Madrid, AVE to León, a night there and 11 days walking. A night in Santiago and met some friends there and then home. It's the fourth time I've done a stint on the Camino, but the first since 2010 and the first on my own. It went well enough, especially after I posted 4.5kg of dirty clothes and deadweight to Santiago and lightened my load a bit! I'm on my 'phone and unable to resurrect a photo' of the 2010 Spanish €10 coin with the botafumeira from Santiago cathedral, but here's a photo' of the cathedral from last Tuesday (12th September). ATB, Aidan.

I was away for a couple of weeks holidays and came back to 5 coins 🙂 Here's one of them: - Cr. 128/1, 3.83g, 19mm - Shield & carnyx denarius of ca. 206-200 BC. Fairly worn, but a bargain at €44 from CGB - it was in one of their E-auctions as an example of Cr. 53/2. ATB, Aidan.

Here's another Flann-related song - in "At Swim-Two-Birds" a character, Jem Casey, writes "pomes" such as "The Workman's Friend". When things go wrong and will not come right, Though you do the best you can, When life looks black as the hour of night - A pint of plain is your only man. When money's tight and hard to get And your horse has also ran, When all you have is a heap of debt - A pint of plain is your only man. When health is bad and your heart feels strange, And your face is pale and wan, When doctors say you need a change, A pint of plain is your only man. When food is scarce and your larder bare And no rashers grease your pan, When hunger grows as your meals are rare - A pint of plain is your only man. In time of trouble and lousey strife, You have still got a darlint plan You still can turn to a brighter life - A pint of plain is your only man. -- Flann O'Brien (Brian O'Nolan) Coincidentally, the actor in the previous De Selby video, Domhnall Gleeson, is the son of Brendan and brother of Fergus here. A coin with Marsyas is suitable 😄 Gens: Marcia Moneyer: L. Censorinus Coin: Silver Denarius - Laureate head of Apollo right L. CENSOR - The satyr Marsyas, standing left with wine-skin on shoulder; behind him, column surmounted by draped figure (Minerva?) Mint: Rome (82 BC) Wt./Size/Axis: 3.90g / 17mm / 6h References: RSC 24 (Marcia) Sydenham 737 Crawford 363/1d Acquisition: Artemide Aste Online Auction Asta 24.2E #1393 (part) 20-Oct-2013 @JeandAcre - O'Nolan's language ability probably stemmed from his growing up in an Irish-speaking household and being home-schooled until he was 12. Then he went to Synge Street and later the rather posh Blackrock College, where he would have studied Latin and Greek. He studied English, Irish and German in UCD. He claimed to have studied in Germany in 1933 and 1934, but according to Cronin (I found the biography), his German was mediocre and he was no polyglot. There's no record of the travelling studentship he claimed to have or his having studied in Cologne at all. He may have spent two or three weeks in Germany on holiday in 1934 - probably the only time he left Ireland - and exaggerated the trip later. Time Magazine of 23rd August 1943 had an article about him - "Eire's Columnist" - where it says during his time in Germany he "met and married 18-year-old Clara Ungerland, blonde, violin-playing daughter of a Cologne basketweaver. She died a month later. O'Nolan returned to Éire and never mentions her." This was a surprise to his friends and family 😄 Ah - here's another song - the main character in Sing Street, the 2016 movie, makes the opposite education move to O'Nolan, going from a posh school to Synge Street when his family can't afford to send him to the private school. ATB, Aidan.

Here's a medal that arrived today - not ancient, but by a Roman Pontifex Maximus as I always say 😛 I like the detail in these - Leo XIII from 1901 - a big one at 44mm diameter and 39.14g. There appears to be a die break on the reverse at the bottom. I found a photo' of the tomb of Innocent III in St. Peter's depicted on the medal on Wikipedia. <Whoops! - I read the legend again and this tomb is in St. John Lateran - the Wikipedia entry for Innocent III is incorrect! In fact, I took a photo' last year which includes it - follows the Wikipedia photo'> My photo' - Innocent's tomb is on the left. ATB, Aidan.

Actually, I got an example of Cr. 487/2a recently- without the S-F on the reverse. ATB, Aidan.

! There are only two major novels in English by Flann - "At Swim-Two-Birds" and "The Third Policeman". Most of the first print run of "At Swim" was destroyed when a warehouse in London burned down in an air raid in 1940 and "The Third Policeman" was rejected by his publisher as too fantastic and was only published after his death. So, he wasn't very successful during his lifetime - after the rejection, he claimed to have left the manuscript of "The Third Policeman" on a tram, while it was actually in his study, and wrote his next novel in Irish - "An Béal Bocht" (The Poor Mouth) - this is a parody of a genre of Irish misery autobiographies. He wrote no more novels for 20 years until "The Dalkey Archive", which copies parts of "The Third Policeman", and "The Hard Life", which isn't very good. Most of O'Brien's output for the 25 years before his death was through his Irish Times newspaper column, published under the Myles ns gCopaleen pseudonym. This was originally in Irish, then alternating between Irish and English and finally mostly in English, with occasional forays into French and German and passages of Latin and Greek for good measure. Several volumes of the columns have been published in book form - some of them are silly stories ending with awful puns, others semi-serious or totally fantastic. He would apparently write to the paper under various names complaining about the columns and then reply to himself under different names praising the original column. As an example of a pun story (these always refer to Keats and Chapman and there's a whole book of these columns)... When the poet Keats was a lad he was undecided as to his ultimate profession, and spent a few years as a potato factor. One day a French noblewoman who was on holiday in the vicinity ordered a ton of Arran Banners. When Keats was delivering the potatoes he was attacked by a ferocious pom, which the lady kept as a pet. The poet presented the pom with the father and the mother of a fair-day kick, and carried on quietly with his work. "When I make up my mind to deliver spuds," he remarked afterwards to Chapman, "I have no intention of letting a pomme de terre me." Chapman took no notice. O'Nolan may have been the author of several science fiction and detective novels under other names, but according to Wikipedia it's uncertain. He tried plays and even a ballet for radio in two parts, none of which met with much success. His daytime job was as a civil servant until he was eventually forced to retire on health grounds (alcoholism) but mostly for criticising a minister in a newspaper column. I can't find it right now, but I have Anthony Cronin's biography of Flann O'Brien - "No Laughing Matter" - which, to take a quote in the article linked to below describes his life as "a relentless catalogue of frustration, bitterness and repression, accompanied of course by a slow descent into alcoholism". https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v35/n20/jonathan-coe/clutching-at-railings Anyway, well worth a read! ATB, Aidan.

I'm not really a Hozier fan, but when he brings out a song and video inspired by a character created by my favourite writer, I have to give it a listen... De Selby https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/books/the-fantastic-flann-o-brien-1.611390 Here's a recent acquisition I photographed today: Obv. legend: S P Q R IMP CAESARI AVG COS XI TRI POT VI Obv. description: Head of Augustus, bare, right Portrait: Augustus Rev. legend: CIVIB ET SIGN MILIT A PART RECVP (or RECVPER) Rev. description: Triumphal arch surmounted by quadriga, figures to the right and left RIC 136/137 It was sold as RIC 137, but as I can't read all the reverse legend it could be RIC 136. (RIC 137 ends with RECVPER and 136 with RECVP). ATB, Aidan.