Apparently unpublished Roman Egyptian obol, supposedly depicting a cat: what is it really?

[DonnaML]

This coin was posted earlier today for a few hours in the Facebook Ancient & Medieval Coins Sales group, until the owner deleted the post. It was described as an unpublished Marcus Aurelius obol from Roman Alexandria, supposedly depicting a female domestic cat (perhaps Bastet?) on the reverse, seated right with her face turned forward and visible whiskers on each side of her head. The asking price was $2,000(!). The reverse looked so odd to me that I decided to save the posted images, which is why I still have them even though the post itself, and the comments, were deleted. 

Several people expressed pronounced skepticism that this was actually supposed to represent a cat, and I agreed in my own comment. Although I don't remember the exact words I used, the gist of it was that although the coin certainly looks like a genuine Roman Alexandrian coin, those round, Mickey Mouse-ish "ears" and pronounced "whiskers" don't resemble anything I've ever seen on Ancient Egyptian art of any kind from any period, whether on Bastet or any other cat (or panther, lioness, etc.).  The ears are invariably much more oblong, and are either pointed or rounded at the tip.

Furthermore, I've never seen a cat (domestic or otherwise) depicted as seated or crouching right with its head turned back so it faces forward. As an example, I posted this photo of my pale blue glazed faience amulet of Bastet from the 26th Dynasty-Ptolemaic period, purchased from Harmer Rooke in New York City on Feb. 26, 1990:

And here's an obol of Antoninus Pius, Year 10 (Emmett 1777) with a panther on the reverse, posted last year by @Edessa:

The only cataloged Roman Alexandrian coin I know of supposedly depicting a domestic cat on the reverse (standing right) is a Nomes obol from the Bubastite Nome, issued in Hadrian Year 11 (Emmett 1287, BMC 16 Roman Alexandria N5  p. 342, RPC III 6511 [https://rpc.ashmus.ox.ac.uk/coins/3/6511], Dattari 6220); here's the Dattari example:

Which doesn't look anything like the posted coin.

In any event, if one looks closely at the posted coin, it very much appears that regardless of the "ears" and "whiskers," that head actually faces right, and is not really turned back to face forward.  Which led several people to suggest that the reverse figure actually depicts a sphinx -- Egyptian-style rather than Greek, because it doesn't have wings and appears to have a kind of headdress like the Great Sphinx's. But, of course, that wouldn't explain the "ears" and "whiskers." Could they have been added later on? 

Whatever the posted coin represents -- cat, panther, or sphinx -- it does seem to be unpublished, assuming that it's genuine. Whether that's really Marcus Aurelius, or a different emperor, I can't find anything that looks like this reverse. (I can decipher the "LI" at the top of the reverse, but not the final symbol, so it could be anything from Year 11 to Year 19.) 

Any suggestions?

Edited November 18, 2024 by DonnaML

[wuntbedruv]

The 'whiskers' and 'ears' look like they stand proud. Could this be a series of very fortuitous die-breaks?

[ominus1]

..to me it lQQks like a cat.....maybe with mickey mouse ears on...:)...they held the cat in high regards so its not out of the question it is...

Edited November 18, 2024 by ominus1

[CPK]

Strange! It doesn't look exactly like a cat, but I don't know what else it might be, unless the whole thing is a forgery. But the style and fabric are very good.

The ears and whiskers could have been added later (say to a shinx type reverse) with additional metal and then the whole thing repatinated.

*deleted*

 

*Edit: Oops! Got this one confused with another thread. NAC is not going to be selling the coin as far as I know.

Edited November 18, 2024 by CPK

[Ryro]

No ears nor whiskers. Just a right facing Sphinx with possible die breaks and or wear causing it to look like a facing cat.

[JAZ Numismatics]

24 minutes ago, Ryro said:

No ears nor whiskers. Just a right facing Sphinx with possible die breaks and or wear causing it to look like a facing cat.

Except the Sphinx on Alexandrian obols is always fully reclining. The only animal that sits in that pose is the griffon. If it isn't a new type, someone may have tooled a griffon into a cat.

[Broucheion]

2 hours ago, JAZ Numismatics said:

The only animal that sits in that pose is the griffon. If it isn't a new type, someone may have tooled a griffon into a cat.

Hi All,

The griffin also has pronounced mammaries, which this reverse also shows. The entire region to the right of the head and around the head and back of the animal is tooled. I think @JAZ Numismatics hit it on the head. Alexandrian depictions of Bast on coins never show whiskers. 
 

Hi @DonnaML, can you let us know who was peddling this item?

- Broucheion 

Edited November 18, 2024 by Broucheion

[Ancient Coin Hunter]

Since Egyptians invariably used an aspective style of art I am not familiar with any creature ever turning its head to face the onlooker in any representation. Hence my opinion is that either it is a griffon or sphinx with some tooling. I thought initially perhaps that the mickey mouse ears were blundered lettering, but now I don't think so. 

[-monolith-]

I agree with @Ryro, it's a right facing Sphinx with die cuds, If you download the image and zoom in close you can see the recessed portion of the Sphinx face and obvious cud marks from a damaged die. The "whisker" marking are a little odd, I don't believe it is due to die damage but who knows. It's seems to be a similar style to these, just seated instead of lying:

 

[DonnaML]

Thanks for all the suggestions, everyone.

First: @Broucheion, is it really fair to disclose this person's name even though I don't know if he's a professional dealer? On the other hand, he's been offering a lot of coins recently in the Facebook sales group. And $2,000 was a very ambitious price for any Roman Alexandrian obol without a pedigree, even assuming that it really is completely genuine and previously unpublished. So: without actually mentioning his name right now, he apparently lives in Reading, England, and he must be from Romania originally because his Facebook page, although sparse, has several posts written in Romanian. Where he gets his coins, I have no idea. I don't get the impression that he was deliberately trying to deceive people or was responsible for any tooling himself. I just think he doesn't know much about Roman Alexandrian coins, and must be remarkably gullible, assuming he really thought that cartoon face with those ears and whiskers was real. And perhaps he got dollar signs in his eyes. He did take down his post, but for all I know he'll peddle the same coin elsewhere with the same description.

@JAZ Numismatics, I believe you're correct that all the known representations of the Egyptian-style sphinx on Roman Alexandrian coins show the sphinx fully reclining, like the Great Sphinx itself. So, barring a previously unknown type of represenation, that eliminates the Egyptian sphinx as a candidate.

Which leaves the Greek-style sphinx and the griffin as candidates (the difference being that one has a female human head and the other an eagle's head). But I think the problems with that theory are equally insurmountable: both the Greek sphinx and the griffin on Roman Alexandrian (and other Roman Provincial) coinage always have extremely noticeable wings

It would have required a rather major amount of tooling to get rid of the wings on this specimen!

Not only that, a search of RPC for griffins and Greek-style sphinxes in Roman Alexandrian coinage shows that in addition to the wings, one forepaw of both creatures almost invariably rests on a wheel, as in this Hadrian drachm in my collection depicting a sphinx:

I have no Roman Alexandrian griffins, but this one from Moesia Inferior closely resembles the ones I found in my RPC search:

Philip II, AE Tetrassarion, 247-249 AD, Moesia Inferior, Tomis [now Constanţa, Romania]. Obv. Bareheaded, draped, and cuirassed bust right, seen from rear, Μ ΙΟΥΛ ΦΙΛΙΠΠΟC ΚΑΙCΑΡ / Rev. Griffin seated left with right paw on top of wheel [representing Nemesis*], ΜΗ-ΤΡΟ-Π-ΠΟ, continued in exergue in two lines: NTOΥ ΤΟΜΕ/ΩϹ (ME ligate), Δ in right field [signifying the denomination, 4 assaria]. 27 mm., 12.22 g. RPC [Roman Provincial Coinage] VIII Online 28171 [temporary ID number] (see https://rpc.ashmus.ox.ac.uk/type/28171) [this coin is Specimen 7, used as primary illustration for type, see https://rpc.ashmus.ox.ac.uk/coin/156187 ]; Varbanov 5781 [Varbanov, Ivan, Greek Imperial Coins And Their Values, Volume I: Dacia, Moesia Superior & Moesia Inferior (English Edition) (Bourgas, Bulgaria, 2005)]. Purchased from Herakles Numismatics, Jan. 2021; ex. I-Nummis, Paris, Mail Bid Sale 6, Nov. 7, 2008, Lot 399  (see https://www.coinarchives.com/a/openlink.php?l=239902|348|399|a3b582d0b87f863b39d084dd851a7a89). [“Scarce”: 11 specimens in RPC (including this coin), 6 examples in ACSearch (including this coin).]

 

*See https://www.getty.edu/publications/romanmosaics/catalogue/8/ : “The image of a griffin supporting one of its forepaws on a wheel appears in Roman art by the first century AD. The wheel, a symbol of the cyclical movement of human fortune, and the winged griffin are both distinctive attributes of Nemesis, the goddess of vengeance, who is also often represented with wings. In a first-century AD wall painting from the House of the Fabii at Pompeii, Apollo and two female figures are accompanied by a winged griffin with a wheel. This motif also occurs on coins of Alexandria dating to the reign of the emperor Domitian (AD 81–96). Scenes depicting Nemesis with a griffin are especially common during the second and third centuries AD and occur in many different media, including coins, gems, statues, and funerary and votive reliefs. The particular image of a griffin resting its paw on a wheel, typically seated at the foot of Nemesis, is so pervasive that it eventually became a symbol for the goddess herself. For example, a limestone mold of the second to third centuries AD from Egypt, possibly from Alexandria, shows a griffin and a wheel with the Greek inscription Nemesis.

Representations of the griffin with a wheel unaccompanied by Nemesis, as in the Getty mosaic, are particularly common in North Africa and the eastern periphery of the Roman Empire. The motif appears in the second and third centuries AD in Egyptian statuettes in faience [see image at https://www.getty.edu/publications/romanmosaics/assets/images/pics/pic_30_faience-egyptian-statuette.jpg], relief stelai from the amphitheater at Leptis Magna in present-day Libya; tomb paintings in Jordan; a votive marble statue from Erez, Israel, bearing a dedicatory inscription in Greek (dated AD 210–211); gems from Caesarea Maritima in Israel and Gadara in Jordan; and terracotta tesserae from Palmyra. While the worship of Nemesis was widespread across the Roman Empire, it was particularly prevalent in Egypt, where she had a pre-Roman cult, and in Syria and the surrounding regions, where she was associated with several important local deities, including the classical goddesses Tyche (personification of fortune) and Nike (personification of victory) and the Arabic deities Allath (goddess of war) and Manawat (goddess of fate).” [Footnotes omitted.]

In short, I think the griffin and Greek sphinx can be eliminated as well. 

I also searched in RPC for Roman Alexandrian panthers and lion[esse]s, but I found none with the particular stance on the coin at issue, namely, seated or crouching with front legs straight. Every one was fully standing, like these:

Interestingly, some do have their heads turned -- but all with the head turned backwards to the left, not to face the viewer. There's even one panther that has visible ears sort of like the one on the specimen at issue (albeit in a different position on the head), on a coin from Antoninus Pius Year 24 with Faustina II on the obverse. See https://rpc.ashmus.ox.ac.uk/coins/4.4/2231 . The coin illustrating the type appears to be an old plaster cast of a specimen in the British Museum collection:

Another example, from the BNF in Paris; see https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv1b8484635s

Both are certainly suggestive, but still present the problem of the crouching/seated stance on the Facebook coin. Not to mention that there's nothing in the known Marcus Aurelius corpus of Roman Alexandrian coins remotely like the Facebook coin (assuming we all agree with the identification of Marcus Aurelius on the obverse). 

TLDR: I'm still mystified!

Edited November 18, 2024 by DonnaML

[TIF]

What a fabulous post and wonderful mystery!  I'm glad you thought to save images of the coin.  I agree with your assessments, Donna-- baffling.

The fabric looks authentic.  There is nothing amiss about the obverse.  The reverse does not appear to be a modified sphinx because of the sitting position, nor does it appear to be a modified griffin because I cannot find any right-facing griffin obols for Marcus Aurelius.  Additionally, the placement of the date (LI... what... H?) would be in the way of where the potential griffin wings would have been, if this is were an altered griffin.

When I first looked at it I thought it was a sphinx, head facing right, with some extraneous blobs (the Mickey Mouse ears).  The "whiskers" are baffling.  It's all baffling.  I'd love to have the coin to study... but certainly not for $2K.

Edited November 19, 2024 by TIF

[TIF]

If this is an authentic but altered coin, then perhaps the most likely host is Emmett 1916, hawk standing right.  The shkent, less some material, could become the Mickey Mouse ears.  Not sure how the legs would be reconciled though because the hawk's legs are set further back than this "cat".

[DonnaML]

Thank you, @TIF. I appreciate your trying to find a Marcus Aurelius obol that "works" as the basis for this coin. Here's a photo showing two specimens I found on RPC of the obol with the hawk reverse:

In order to turn one of these into the reverse posted on Facebook, I think somebody would essentially have had to smooth out and recarve the entire hawk.  It seems like a whole lot of effort to expend, whether in modern or ancient times, to create a creature that looks so crude, in a stance (crouching right with head facing front) that otherwise doesn't seem to exist in ancient Egyptian art, at least in the Greco-Roman period. 

There's also a known Marcus Aurelius obol with a panther reverse (Emmett 1918; "Panther standing r., Head l.").  But even though the two images I found, also at RPC, aren't great (one is presumably a photo of a cast), they're good enough to tell that the type doesn't really work either as an original for the Facebook coin, for the same reason as the other standing panthers. See https://rpc.ashmus.ox.ac.uk/coins/4.4/2229 :

Of course, if we assume that the Facebook coin (or its original) is both genuine and unpublished, it doesn't really matter that there appears to be no reasonable prototype among known Marcus Aurelius obols or other small bronzes.  But the apparent absence of any reasonable prototype among known obols of any emperor certainly raises serious questions, since it requires the double coincidence of this reverse type (or its original prior to tooling) being both unpublished and unique.

I'm contemplating emailing a link to this thread to Keith Emmett to ask him what he thinks. Because I'm ready to give up on trying to solve this mystery!

[TIF]

@DonnaML, I haven't had time for a more formal check but I think the obverse is a die match to other obols (may include more than one reverse type).  Very interesting.  It probably is worthwhile asking Emmett to have a look.  

[Edessa]

Being Domitian, this post has no relevance other than it's an example of a "hawk" obol similar to the ones Donna included in her post. But I thought it was an interesting coin considering it's an Emmett R4 and arguably as nice as any of the few examples on RPC, ACSearch and Coinarchives. You don't have to put out a fortune to buy nice Roman Alexandrian obols.

Roman Egypt, Alexandria. Domitian. AD 81-96. Æ Obol (19mm, 3.83g, 12h). Dated RY 8 (AD 88/9). Laureate head right; L H (date) to right / Hawk standing right, wearing skhent. Köln 360; Dattari (Savio) 623; K&G 24.90; RPC II 2560; Emmett 317.8 (R4). Dark brown patina with earthen highlights, obverse off center. VF. Ex CNG e574 (6 Nov 2024), Lot 282. Estimate $100; Hammer $100.