Roma Numismatics Ltd
Auction XVI 26 Sep 2018
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Augustus AR Denarius. Samos, 21-20 BC. CAESAR, bare head right / AVGVSTVS, bull standing right. RIC 475; C. 28; BMCRE 663; Sutherland, "L'attribution des deniers augustéens aux types du temple, de la couronne et du jeune taureau" in RN 1974, 61f; BN 941. 2.94g, 20mm, 1h.
About Good Extremely Fine; beautiful light cabinet tone with hints of iridescence.
Ex Gorny & Mosch 114, 4 March 2002, lot 209.
Among the first coins to be struck bearing the new title Augustus, this denarius is of exceptional style and engraved with beautiful craftsmanship. Struck in Pergamum, the reverse type remains an enigma with scholarship as yet unable to settle on a definitive meaning, though various suggestions have been posed.
Firstly, perhaps the bull is based on Myron's bronze heifer, a statue much admired in antiquity and of which Augustus must have been aware: he is known to have restored Myron's Apollo, which Marc Antony had taken, to Ephesus. However, an alternative statue has been proposed by Sutherland in RIC to be the basis for this reverse type. He links this issue with Augustus' visit to Samos in winter 21/20 BC, where he would likely have seen a statue of Poseidon Taureos in the sanctuary, an event he later commemorated on the coinage.
More personal to Augustus himself is the theory that what we see here is a reference to the famous 'butting bull' type seen on the coinage of Thurium. Born Gaius Octavius Thurinus in celebration of his father's victory in battle against a Spartacist army, which took place outside the town, this reverse type would be a personal allegory to Augustus and the high regard in which his family was held by the townspeople of Thurium.
About Good Extremely Fine; beautiful light cabinet tone with hints of iridescence.
Ex Gorny & Mosch 114, 4 March 2002, lot 209.
Among the first coins to be struck bearing the new title Augustus, this denarius is of exceptional style and engraved with beautiful craftsmanship. Struck in Pergamum, the reverse type remains an enigma with scholarship as yet unable to settle on a definitive meaning, though various suggestions have been posed.
Firstly, perhaps the bull is based on Myron's bronze heifer, a statue much admired in antiquity and of which Augustus must have been aware: he is known to have restored Myron's Apollo, which Marc Antony had taken, to Ephesus. However, an alternative statue has been proposed by Sutherland in RIC to be the basis for this reverse type. He links this issue with Augustus' visit to Samos in winter 21/20 BC, where he would likely have seen a statue of Poseidon Taureos in the sanctuary, an event he later commemorated on the coinage.
More personal to Augustus himself is the theory that what we see here is a reference to the famous 'butting bull' type seen on the coinage of Thurium. Born Gaius Octavius Thurinus in celebration of his father's victory in battle against a Spartacist army, which took place outside the town, this reverse type would be a personal allegory to Augustus and the high regard in which his family was held by the townspeople of Thurium.