Numismatica Ars Classica
Auction 138 18-19 May 2023
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Galeria Valeria, wife of Galerius Maximianus.
Aureus, Nicomedia 308-310, AV 5.34 g. GAL VAL – ERIA AVG Diademed and draped bust r. Rev. VENERI V – I – CTRICI Venus standing facing, head l., holding apple in upraised r. hand and raising drapery over l. shoulder; in exergue, SMN. C 1. RIC 53. C 1. Depeyrot 13/1. Calicó 4964.
Extremely rare and in exceptional condition for the issue. Extremely fine
Ex NAC 27, 2004, 505 and NAC 34, 2006, 81 sales.
Of Valeria Galeria's life as Augusta, while her husband was alive, we know very little. As a daughter of the Senior Augustus Diocletian, she was wed to her father's new Caesar, Galerius, in 292 or 293. Galerius was famous for his persecutions of Christians, and we are told that she was especially supportive of her husband in that regard. After Galerius' death, however, her stable, regal life was turned upside down: fearing the treatment she would receive from the emperor Licinius I, she and her mother sought asylum at the court of Maximinus Daia, her former husband's nephew. However, when Daia proposed marriage to her, and she refused, he confiscated all of her properties and banished the mother and daughter to Syria, where they are said to have wandered until being discovered in 314 or 315 and subsequently beheaded by Licinius.
Aureus, Nicomedia 308-310, AV 5.34 g. GAL VAL – ERIA AVG Diademed and draped bust r. Rev. VENERI V – I – CTRICI Venus standing facing, head l., holding apple in upraised r. hand and raising drapery over l. shoulder; in exergue, SMN. C 1. RIC 53. C 1. Depeyrot 13/1. Calicó 4964.
Extremely rare and in exceptional condition for the issue. Extremely fine
Ex NAC 27, 2004, 505 and NAC 34, 2006, 81 sales.
Of Valeria Galeria's life as Augusta, while her husband was alive, we know very little. As a daughter of the Senior Augustus Diocletian, she was wed to her father's new Caesar, Galerius, in 292 or 293. Galerius was famous for his persecutions of Christians, and we are told that she was especially supportive of her husband in that regard. After Galerius' death, however, her stable, regal life was turned upside down: fearing the treatment she would receive from the emperor Licinius I, she and her mother sought asylum at the court of Maximinus Daia, her former husband's nephew. However, when Daia proposed marriage to her, and she refused, he confiscated all of her properties and banished the mother and daughter to Syria, where they are said to have wandered until being discovered in 314 or 315 and subsequently beheaded by Licinius.