ROMAN PROVINCIAL; Syria; Philip I CE 24-248

Bi Tetradrachm; 25 mm, 9.55 g, 6 h, Antioch, CE 248-249

McAlee 947

Prieur 449

O: radiate draped and cuirassed bust r., AYTOK K M IOYΛI ΦIΛIΠΠOC CϵB

R: eagle stg r holding wreath in beak, ΔHMAPX ϵΞ OYCIAC YΠATO Δ in ex.

ANTIOXIA/SC

Ex: Dionysus/Germany

Ex: Warren Esty Collection

 

Apparently scarce variety counted 12 examples on two sites of which this is one. 

An altar in the Archaeological Museum of Girona, Spain dedicated to Philip from the people of Girona photographed by me during a visit in August 2018, translations in English, Catalan and Spanish appear below.

 

GREECE/Seleucid; Seleucus I Nicator BCE 312-281

AR Drachm, 4.01g, 16 mm, 6 h, Seleucia on Tigris II mint, from c. 296/5 BCE

SC 131.5a

ESM 77

O: Laureate head of Zeus right
R: Athena brandishing a shield and spear in a elephant quadriga right, anchor and monograms above  A/T  behind Athena and Θ above the elephants. Dotted border.  BAΣIΛEΩΣ on l., and ΣEΛEYKOY in ex.  

GREECE/Seleucid; Antiochus IX Philopator BCE 114-95

AE 18-20 mm, 5.34 g,  11 h, minted probably in Phoenicia, c. BCE 112-101

SC 2388.8 type

SNG Spaer 2743

O: Bust of winged Eros r. dotted border

R: [B]AΣΙΛΕΩ[Σ] ANTIOXOY in two lines on r., ΦΙΛΟΠATOP[OΣ] on l., Nike adv l., holding wreath.

Ex: WKR Collection

cf. please refer to very interesting information pertaining to this type in SC II vol I pp. 542-544.

HAWAI'I/Kalakaua I 1874-1891

AR 25 c (6.21 g) KM #5 (mintage: 500,000 but 242,600 remain after redemption and melting) 

O: KALAKAUA I KING OF HAWAII/1883, hd r.

R: UA MAU KE EA O KA AINA I KA PONO/1/4/ D./HAPAHA, crown above COA dividing ¼ and D.

Note: (from Wikipedia) "Ua Mau ke Ea o ka ʻĀina i ka Pono is a well-known Hawaiian phrase which was adopted as the motto of the state of Hawaii. It is commonly translated as "The life of the land is perpetuated in righteousness".

The motto is also utilized by the Hawaiian sovereignty movement having been the motto of the Kingdom of Hawaii before it's overthrow by American business interests in 1893. The motto appears to be the one constant connecting Hawaii past and present.

Iolani Palace, Honolulu constructed during the reign of Kalakaua and the only royal palace on US soil

Greece/Seleucid; Demetrius I BCE 162-150

AE 17 mm, 4.86 g, 12 h, Seleucia on the Tigris mint, minted early in reign after BCE 161

SC 1691

HGC 839 (R2)

O: jugate busts of Demetrius I, diademed, and Laodike V, veiled and wearing stephane

R: [BAΣIΛEΩΣ/ΔHMHTPIOY] Nike stg. L., holding wreath and palm. No symbols or monograms

Bevelled edge on obs with casting spurs. 

IRAN/Arsacid; Parthia: Vologases III CE 105-147

AR Drachm, 3.65 g, 20 mm, 12h,  Ecbatana mint. 

Sellwood 78.5

Obv/ bare-headed bust left with long, pointed beard wearing diadem with loop at the top and three ends; earring visible; border of dots.

Rev/ archer seated right on throne holding bow; archer's seat represented as horizontal line; blundered Greek legend; monogram for Ecbatana below bow

IRAN/Arsacid; Parthia: Orodes II BCE 57-38

AR Drachm, 3.73g,  21mm, 12h, Ecbatana mint

Sellwood 48.8

Obv: bust left with pointed beard wearing diadem and griffin-ended torque; star before, crescent above star behind; wart visible on forehead; circular border of pellets

Rev: beardless archer wearing bashlyk and cloak seated right on throne, holding bow in right hand; behind archer, anchor; below bow, monogram for Ecbatana; no border; seven-line Greek inscription = ΒΑΣΙΛΕΩΣ ΒΑΣΙΛΕΩΝ ΑΡΣΑΚΟΥ ΕΥΕΡΓΕΤΟΥ ΔΙΚΑΙΟΥ ΕΠΙΦΑΝΟΥΣ ΦΙΛΕΛΛΗΝΟΣ

A leaden aside....

Lead has been utilized for a variety of purposes throughout history; coins being an example of the more sedate usages.

Mainly, Lead has been used in human warfare as well as in everyday products in the recent past that have contributed to needlessly killing and poisoning many generations of humanity.

The examples provided below, span two millenia and are objects utilized in different kinds of warfare, the first from a battle in Spain c. BCE 45 and the second from the American Civil War 1861-1865.

Roman Glans, c. BCE 45, likely from the Battle of Munda

39 x 15 mm, 37.85 g (views of all sides)

American Civil War 1861-1865, dropped 58 caliber Minie ball likely Confederate manufacture (Georgia?), conical cavity. 22mm long, 12 mm wide, 6 mm deep cavity and 26.43 g., MM 380 type, TT 165v, weapon rifle musket. paper cartridge, muzzle load, percussion cap ignition.

before use:

after use:

previous flipped over. 26.27 g

HAWAI'I/Kalakaua I 1874-1891

AR 10 c (2.43 g) KM #3 (mintage: 250,000) 

O: KALAKAUA I KING OF HAWAII/1883, hd r.

R: UA MAU KE EA O KA AINA I KA PONO/ONE DIME/UMI KENETA, crown above denomination inside wreath.

Note: (from Wikipedia) "Ua Mau ke Ea o ka ʻĀina i ka Pono is a well-known Hawaiian phrase which was adopted as the motto of the state of Hawaii. It is commonly translated as "The life of the land is perpetuated in righteousness".

The motto is also utilized by the Hawaiian sovereignty movement having been the motto of the Kingdom of Hawaii before it's overthrow by American business interests in 1893. The motto appears to be the one constant connecting Hawaii past and present.

Nu'uanu Petroglyph of human figure and dog near Kapena Falls, Oahu, HI

A Hiker Found an Extremely Rare Gold Coin almost 2,000 Years Old

NOTE: not a gold "denarius" as the expert denotes, but an aureus, RCV 3338 (RIC 820, BMCRE 699) minted in Rome CE 107 and valued by Sear in 2002 in EF at $16,500

OCRE reference with photo,

The newly found example is much nicer than the example illustrated in OCRE that resides in the BM

France/ 17th Century Jeton

Louis XIV CE 1643-1715 (no date) minted in Lorraine

AE Jeton; 28mm, 6.56g, 6h.

F. 12542

O: LVD XIIII D G FR ET NAV REX, King on horse to left. 
R: HOC SYDERE + LILIA FLORENT, crowned coat of arms surrounded by double collar

ISLAMIC/Lu’lu’id/Badr ad-Din Lu’lu’ بدر الدين لؤلؤ CE 1233-1258

AE Fals, 26mm, 8.74gm, 8h, Al-Jazirah mint AH 649/CE 1251-1252 (mint and date not legible)

SS 70

Album 1875 (RR)

O: Kalima, name and titles of the 'Abbasid caliph al-Mustansir; in margin, mint and date formula.

R: kalima continued, name and titles of Lu'lu' 

ISLAMIC/Ghorid; Mu'izz ad-Din Muhammad b. Sam AH 567-602/CE 1171-1206

AR Dirham 29 mm, 4.57 g, Ghazna mint AH 597-599/CE 1200-1202

citing Ghiyath ad-Din, square in circle type, struck from 97-98% silver

Album 1771 (S)

Zeno.ru #164641 (this coin)

From NY TIMES 9 January 2016---‘Broken System’ Allows ISIS to Profit From Looted Antiquities

"SHUMEN, Bulgaria — Acting on a tip, the police raided four homes in eastern Bulgaria, looking for contraband that regularly traverses this country on the way to markets in Western Europe and America. In one rusting shed behind an apartment block here, they found a cache of looted antiquities: 19 classical statues and fragments of marble or limestone.

Among them was a square tablet depicting a procession. If genuine, its style would make it neither Roman nor Greek, like the rest, but even older, dating back nearly 5,000 years. Its appearance suggested it came from the ancient Sumerian city of Lagash, in what is today southern Iraq."

Follow the link below for the remainder of the article:

‘Broken System’ Allows ISIS to Profit From Looted Antiquities

ROME/Caracalla CE 198-217

AR Denarius , Rome mint, CE 212 , 3.65g 19mm

OBS: laureate bust right, ANTONINVS PIVS AVG BRIT

REV: Serapis wearing polos, raising hand and holding scepter.,

PM TRP XV COS III PP

VM 59/1(VB1), RIC 194

In CE 212, Caracalla issued his "Constitutio Antoniniana" granting Roman citizenship to all free inhabitants of the Roman Empire. Roman historian Cassius Dio (d. CE 235)  was a contemporary to the events of 212 and wrote in his history the following (78:9):

 Now this great admirer of Alexander, Antoninus, was fond of spending money upon the soldiers, great numbers of whom he kept in attendance upon him, alleging one excuse after another and one war after another; but he made it his business to strip, despoil, and grind down all the rest of mankind, and the senators by no means least. In the first place, there were the gold crowns that he was repeatedly demanding, on the constant pretext that he had conquered some enemy or other; and I am not referring, either, to the actual manufacture of the crowns — for what does that amount to? — but to the vast amount of money constantly being given  under that name by the cities for the customary "crowning", as it is called, of the emperors. Then there were the provisions that we were required to furnish in great quantities on all occasions, and this without receiving any remuneration and sometimes actually at additional cost to ourselves all of which supplies he either bestowed upon the soldiers or else peddled out; and there were the gifts which he demanded from the wealthy citizens and from the various communities; 4 and the taxes, but the new ones which he promulgated and the ten per cent tax that he instituted in place of the five per cent tax applying to the emancipation of slaves, to bequests, and to all legacies; for he abolished the right of succession and exemption from taxes which had been granted in such cases to those who were closely related to the deceased. This was the reason why he made all the people in his empire Roman citizens; nominally he was honouring them, but his real purpose was to increase his revenues by this means, inasmuch as aliens did not have to pay most of these taxes. But apart from all these burdens, we were also compelled to build at our own expense all sorts of houses for him whenever he set out from Rome, and costly lodgings in the middle of even the very shortest journeys; yet he not only never lived in them, but in some cases was not destined even to see them. Moreover, we constructed amphitheatres and race-courses wherever he spent the winter or expected to spend it, all without receiving any contribution from him; and they were all promptly demolished, the sole reason  for their being built in the first place being, apparently, that we might become impoverished. 

(http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Cassius_Dio/78*.html, accessed 01-08-16)

Mary Beard in her recent book "SPQR" seems to differ with the explanation of Dio's that it was for the purposes of taxation that the Constitutio was proclaimed and citizenship was extended to all. She writes that citizenship did not need to be extended in order for taxes to be increased. Nevertheless, the grant of citizenship to all of the free populace of the Empire was an extraordinary development and this coin is one of those that dates from that year.  On the other hand I like this piece because it mentions Britain as one of his titles and has a portrait that appears to have had a frozen grimace for 1,800 years as if he smelled some malodorous scent at the time of striking.  Perhaps he's smelling what became of his reputation despite his extention of citizenship to all. 

ISLAMIC/'Abbasid Governors of Tabaristan; ‘Umar ibn al-‘Ala عمر ابن العلاء CE 771-782

AR Hemidrachm, 24 mm, 2.15 g, 3h, Tabaristan mint PYE 129/AH 164/CE 780/1

Album 56

Malek 80

O: stylized bust of Khushro II, with Arabic inscription in front عمر, ("’Umar"), Pahlavi inscription to left "may his glory increase" and in margins "excellent" and "good".

R: Fire altar with two attendants Pahlavi date to left and mint name TPRWSTAN to right.

"Collecting Coins and the Conflict in Syria"

A version of the article published in the ANS magazine 2015:4, pp. 7-13 by 
Ute Wartenburg Kagan.

Interesting article with some constructive suggestions for getting answers to where your coins come from. 

Time for "don't ask/don't tell" in the collector/dealer relationship to end. 

Collecting Coins and the Conflict in Syria by Ute Wartenburg Kagan

Greece/Seleucid/Interregnum, posthumous issue of Antiochus IV, BCE 146/5

AR Drachm, 17 mm, 3.98 g, 12h, Antioch mint c. BCE 146/5

SC 1886c

HSC 745 (R1-2)

Mørkholm, NC 1960, 9

O: diad hd of Antiochus IV r.

R: BAΣIΛEΩΣ on right ANTIOXOY [E]ΠIΦANOYΣ in two lines on left, in ex. Θ

Apollo std l on omphalos, holding arrow, and grounded bow.