A Few New Coins

[KenDorney]

I don't seem to have much time on my hands these days, but I had like an hour today to myself, which I spent ogling my newer coins.  I picked a few I found pleasing to show off:

[Ryro]

Chunky monkeys!

Is the massive one Macrinus? ( it looks like he's about to eat pie🤪

[KenDorney]

Just now, Ryro said:

Chunky monkeys!

Is the massive one Macrinus? ( it looks like he's about to eat pie🤪

Pupienus, actually.  And he looks like he's had too much pie already!

Edited June 9, 2022 by KenDorney

[DonnaML]

5 minutes ago, KenDorney said:

Pupienus, actually.  And he looks like he's had too much pie already!

I'd like to see what Balbinus looks like, then!

[KenDorney]

4 minutes ago, DonnaML said:

I'd like to see what Balbinus looks like, then!

Also too much pie!!!

[Kali]

Fantastic group of coins. Love them all.

[CPK]

Those are lovely coins!! Now I want to see a photo of the opposite sides. 🙂

 

[Furryfrog02]

Great stuff @KenDorney! Can we see the flip sides?

[KenDorney]

30 minutes ago, Furryfrog02 said:

Great stuff @KenDorney! Can we see the flip sides?

Here ya go.

[Furryfrog02]

Beautiful!
I see Nike on that Pupienus. If you ever get tired of him, feel free to send him my way 😜

[Ryro]

I sound more full of it than a new York real-estate agent! But I swear that was my second guess ☺️

I was just sharing this with some friends in a DM.

My latest Pupienus probably has TWO poopy-anusii!

It features Herakles lifting Aktaion off the ground and away from his mother squeezing him to death (I've gotta assume Herakles crushing you to death would give anyone a poopy-anus):

Edited June 9, 2022 by Ryro
Nude wrestling

[Furryfrog02]

1 minute ago, Ryro said:

TWO poopy-anusii!

Is that the scientific word to use when discussing more than one anus? Asking for a friend...(PS, that friend is me.)

[CPK]

49 minutes ago, KenDorney said:

Here ya go.

Thanks!
My favorites are the Trajan sestertius and that Alexander III tetradrachm.

[Roman Collector]

Man, @KenDorney, that Diva Julia Titi sestertius with the carpentum is SWEET!!

[KenDorney]

14 hours ago, Furryfrog02 said:

Beautiful!
I see Nike on that Pupienus. If you ever get tired of him, feel free to send him my way 😜

I'm only in my 50's, so I have a little time left with him.  I figure I will sell out when I hit retirement!

[Ancient Coin Hunter]

Nobody has posted a Balbinus (e.g., the Gerber baby) sesterce, so here goes:

 

Balbinus. AD 238.

Æ Sestertius, 33mm, 22.9g, 12h; Rome mint. 1st emission.

Obv.: IMP CAES D CAEL BALBINVS AVG; Laureate, draped, and cuirassed bust right.

Rev.: CONCORDIA AVGG; Concordia seated left, holding patera and double cornucopia; S C in exergue.

Reference: RIC IVb 22, p. 171.

[KenDorney]

13 hours ago, CPK said:

Thanks!
My favorites are the Trajan sestertius and that Alexander III tetradrachm.

 

12 hours ago, Roman Collector said:

Man, @KenDorney, that Diva Julia Titi sestertius with the carpentum is SWEET!!

The hole attempt on the Trajan does not bother me one bit.  Its a great type and I have no problems with worn coins, but its clear, clean and has a nice patina!  The Alexander, I liked that one for the portrait style and the goat head.  I dont normally collect silver or Greek particularly, but my collecting focus is, well, actually not focused at all.  I collect whatever seems to be interesting to me.  Finally, the carpentum type coins are really dramatic and a bit sad, really.  I also have one of Agrippina Sr.:

 

 

[Kaleun96]

16 hours ago, KenDorney said:

I don't seem to have much time on my hands these days, but I had like an hour today to myself, which I spent ogling my newer coins.  I picked a few I found pleasing to show off:

Love the Alexander tet! I bid on one (Price 200) myself recently at Heritage but was the underbidder. A fairly rare type, you don't see many of them. I'm particularly interested in this type because the feet of the throne legs flare outwards, almost as if they're depicting animal paws (lion paws would be my guess). I don't know if any other Alexander tets have throne legs with feet that flare out like this, I can't recall any of the top of my head.

It gets more interesting when you look at the preceding types. They mostly have achaemenid throne designs but some examples exhibit clearly Greek thrones and then Price 199 seems to depict three "dots" below the drooping sepal "bell covers", almost as if they misinterpreted what the drooping sepals were. These three dots then seem to spread outwards on some Price 200 examples, which makes them look like the toes of some animal's paw.

Achaemenid thrones are known to sometimes have a lion's paw as part of the leg but they are positioned above the drooping sepals, not below. On the other hand, it seems that the Greeks borrowed a lot of their furniture design from the Egyptians and it was common to see thrones with animal feet at the bottom of the throne legs.

Price 199:

 

Price 200:

Now compare Price 200 with this Greek throne, probably from either late Archaic-early Classical period:

"As an early sculptural example of this simple type one may cite the throne in a seated headless statue from Arcadia in the National Museum, Athens (fig. 45 ). Except for its lion paw feet and the projecting rectangular footstool, it is undecorated. [...] A specially handsome sculptural example of about this time [...] appears on a metope found in the Heraion of Foce del Sele, and now in the Museum of Paestun (fig. 44)." Source: Richter, G. 1966. The Furniture of the Greeks, Etruscans and Romans.

 

Don't mean to hijack the thread, I just find this type in particular quite interesting!

Edited June 10, 2022 by Kaleun96

[KenDorney]

7 hours ago, Kaleun96 said:

Don't mean to hijack the thread, I just find this type in particular quite interesting!

No problem.  It's interesting to see what others are focused on with different aspects of coins.  What I find of interest is that there are two main types for Alexander tets.  Those where Zeus' feet reach the ground and those where he is using a footstool. Its also interesting to note nobody ever makes mention of the difference (though I am sure it has been addressed in some publications.  Its been years since I read Price).  On this type from Pella, it would seem like they intended to place a footstool but simply forgot.  The result is that Zeus seems like a very short dude, where he is too small for the throne and his feet just dont make it to the ground.  Here is the reverse side of mine.

[Kaleun96]

26 minutes ago, KenDorney said:

No problem.  It's interesting to see what others are focused on with different aspects of coins.  What I find of interest is that there are two main types for Alexander tets.  Those where Zeus' feet reach the ground and those where he is using a footstool. Its also interesting to note nobody ever makes mention of the difference (though I am sure it has been addressed in some publications.  Its been years since I read Price).  On this type from Pella, it would seem like they intended to place a footstool but simply forgot.  The result is that Zeus seems like a very short dude, where he is too small for the throne and his feet just dont make it to the ground.  Here is the reverse side of mine.

Now that you mention it, it does seem like there should be a footstool there. Either that or the engraver messed up the proportions. My guess is that the proportions and pose suit a footstool similar to coins 4-5 in this figure, i.e. a fairly basic straight line and not the more Tarsiote-styled footstools with the pronounced "omega" legs (e.g. coin 1). It seems Price 195 has examples of both, footstool and no footstool, and they do tend to be the more basic type.

I know Zervos and Troxell have discussed the footstool to some degree in regards to the earliest Alexander tetradrachms. I think Zervos argues it is more of an Eastern feature while Troxell readily admits there are prior examples from other Greek coinage, though the footstools are of different style. If I remember correctly, Troxell focuses more on the introduction and disappearance of the footstool on the earliest Amphipolis tetradrachms: they are found in Group A types, then only on a few dies in Group B types, and then disappear completely until Group F types, circa 325-323 BC.

If I had to guess why they appear intermittently, my initial thought would be one engraver copying an existing coin that either had a poorly defined footstool or an off-flan footstool and then that was that. It would take a bit of time for that to permeate through the issues over the years via "random selection" and before long no one was engraving the footstool at that mint. Then, either due to an influx of Eastern-minted drachms of tetradrachms from returning soldiers, or some directive to adopt certain stylistic elements, the footstool begins to make a return.

If one had the time and resources, I'm sure some more sense could be made of it all than what is currently known. As far as I know, no one has focussed specifically on the footstools either.

Edited June 10, 2022 by Kaleun96

[KenDorney]

3 minutes ago, Kaleun96 said:

If one had the time and resources, I'm sure some more sense could be made of it all than what is currently known. As far as I know, no one has focussed specifically on the footstools either.

That's beyond the scope of my interest to be honest.  I just think its interesting to note.  As to why they appear and disappear, I would make a complete guess that perhaps they were used by royalty but fell out of favor?  Things were certainly in a general flux culturally by the time Alexander died, and this change could have easily been made on the coinage.