Roma Numismatics Ltd
Auction XX 29-30 Oct 2020
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Aurelian AV Aureus. Rome, AD 272. AVRELIANVS AVG, laureate and cuirassed bust right, with slight drapery on left shoulder / P M TR P COS P P, radiate lion leaping to left, holding thunderbolt in its jaws. RIC 159 (Siscia); Göbl Aurelian, 129An20 (these dies, given as Rome mint), pl. 75 = Vienna 40.413; BN p. 416 and pl. 85, 259; Calicó 4022 (same reverse die); NAC 99, 32 = NGSA 4, 236 (same reverse die). 5.89g, 21mm, 11h.
Near Mint State; well centred and struck on a broad flan. Almost certainly the finest known example of the type, and superior to the only other specimen offered in the past 20 years.
From the Long Valley River Collection;
Ex Roma Numismatics Ltd., Auction XV, 5 April 2018, lot 616;
Ex private European collection.
Featuring a radiate lion carrying a thunderbolt in its jaws - by AD 272 a familiar design on the Roman imperial coinage, first instituted on the coinage of Caracalla over half a century earlier - this aureus of Aurelian bears the same religio-propagandistic message as the coinages of those other emperors who made use of the type. Caracalla, Philip I, Philip II, and Gallienus all campaigned or conducted war in the East; the lion has ever been from the earliest days a solar symbol and hence representative of the East on account of this being the 'land of the rising sun'. The radiate nature of the lion confirms this through an implied amalgamation with Sol (equated with the Greek deity Helios), the initially minor Roman solar god who came to increasing prominence in third century Roman religion, particularly as a patron of soldiers (Sol Invictus). The thunderbolt meanwhile is a clear reference to Jupiter; this composite image therefore has been interpreted as Roman dominance over the east, and as a sign of the high esteem in which Aurelian held solar worship due to the conflated depiction of these divine attributes of Jupiter and Sol.
This aureus was issued in late 271 or 272 for the purpose of Aurelian's war to reclaim the Eastern provinces of Syria, Palestine, Egypt and large parts of Asia Minor from the separatist Palmyrene Empire ruled by Queen Zenobia and her son Vabalathus. In early 272 Aurelian crossed the Bosphorus and his expeditious prosecution of the war, the defeat of the Palmyrene field army at Immae and Emesa, and a general policy of amnesty towards cities that opened their gates resulted in the swift recovery of the breakaway provinces, such that by the Summer of 272 Zenobia and Vabalathus were besieged at Palmyra, which soon capitulated. Zenobia and the Palmyrene council were put on trial in Emesa; most of the high officials were executed, while the queen and her son were taken to Rome to be marched through the city in Aurelian's triumph, Zenobia bound with golden chains to enhance the spectacle. Palmyra itself, though initially spared by Aurelian, spurned the emperor's clemency and rebelled again in 273; this time no quarter was shown - the citizens were massacred and the city was razed to the ground.
Following the successful conclusion of the campaign, Aurelian further strengthened the position of Sol Invictus as one of the premier deities in the Romano-Greek pantheon by constructing a new temple in the Campus Agrippae at Rome which was dedicated on 25 December AD 274 with lavish decorations, many of which were spoils taken from the sack of Palmyra. Meanwhile the priests of Sol were elevated from simple sacerdotes drawn from the lower ranks of Roman society to pontifices and members of the new college of pontifices instituted by the emperor, of which every pontifex of Sol was a member of the elite senatorial class. This apparent usurpation of Jupiter's pre-eminence within the Romano-Greek pantheon may have been eased by the ancient primacy of solar worship in the Eastern parts of the empire and the pre-existing association between the two deities: Helios had occasionally been conflated in classical literature with Zeus, being either directly referred to as Zeus' eye, or clearly implied to be (see for example Hesiod WD 267).
Near Mint State; well centred and struck on a broad flan. Almost certainly the finest known example of the type, and superior to the only other specimen offered in the past 20 years.
From the Long Valley River Collection;
Ex Roma Numismatics Ltd., Auction XV, 5 April 2018, lot 616;
Ex private European collection.
Featuring a radiate lion carrying a thunderbolt in its jaws - by AD 272 a familiar design on the Roman imperial coinage, first instituted on the coinage of Caracalla over half a century earlier - this aureus of Aurelian bears the same religio-propagandistic message as the coinages of those other emperors who made use of the type. Caracalla, Philip I, Philip II, and Gallienus all campaigned or conducted war in the East; the lion has ever been from the earliest days a solar symbol and hence representative of the East on account of this being the 'land of the rising sun'. The radiate nature of the lion confirms this through an implied amalgamation with Sol (equated with the Greek deity Helios), the initially minor Roman solar god who came to increasing prominence in third century Roman religion, particularly as a patron of soldiers (Sol Invictus). The thunderbolt meanwhile is a clear reference to Jupiter; this composite image therefore has been interpreted as Roman dominance over the east, and as a sign of the high esteem in which Aurelian held solar worship due to the conflated depiction of these divine attributes of Jupiter and Sol.
This aureus was issued in late 271 or 272 for the purpose of Aurelian's war to reclaim the Eastern provinces of Syria, Palestine, Egypt and large parts of Asia Minor from the separatist Palmyrene Empire ruled by Queen Zenobia and her son Vabalathus. In early 272 Aurelian crossed the Bosphorus and his expeditious prosecution of the war, the defeat of the Palmyrene field army at Immae and Emesa, and a general policy of amnesty towards cities that opened their gates resulted in the swift recovery of the breakaway provinces, such that by the Summer of 272 Zenobia and Vabalathus were besieged at Palmyra, which soon capitulated. Zenobia and the Palmyrene council were put on trial in Emesa; most of the high officials were executed, while the queen and her son were taken to Rome to be marched through the city in Aurelian's triumph, Zenobia bound with golden chains to enhance the spectacle. Palmyra itself, though initially spared by Aurelian, spurned the emperor's clemency and rebelled again in 273; this time no quarter was shown - the citizens were massacred and the city was razed to the ground.
Following the successful conclusion of the campaign, Aurelian further strengthened the position of Sol Invictus as one of the premier deities in the Romano-Greek pantheon by constructing a new temple in the Campus Agrippae at Rome which was dedicated on 25 December AD 274 with lavish decorations, many of which were spoils taken from the sack of Palmyra. Meanwhile the priests of Sol were elevated from simple sacerdotes drawn from the lower ranks of Roman society to pontifices and members of the new college of pontifices instituted by the emperor, of which every pontifex of Sol was a member of the elite senatorial class. This apparent usurpation of Jupiter's pre-eminence within the Romano-Greek pantheon may have been eased by the ancient primacy of solar worship in the Eastern parts of the empire and the pre-existing association between the two deities: Helios had occasionally been conflated in classical literature with Zeus, being either directly referred to as Zeus' eye, or clearly implied to be (see for example Hesiod WD 267).