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Research Coins: Electronic Auction

 
297, Lot: 477. Estimate $100.
Sold for $130. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

temp. Maximinus II. AD 310-313. Æ (15mm, 1.42 g, 12h). ‘Persecution’ issue. Antioch mint, 8th officina. Jupiter seated left, holding globe and scepter / Victory advancing left, holding wreath and palm frond; H//ANT. Van Heesch, Last 1; McAlee 171h; Vagi 2955; Failmezger 231. Near VF, earthen black patina.


J. van Heesch has provided the latest chronology for these anonymous civic bronzes of the fourth century AD. An active campaign of persecution against local Christians, abetted by Maximinus II, reached its height in Nicomedia, Antioch, and Alexandria. Churches were closed and property was seized from Christians who were expelled from many cities. These three major mint cities struck a series of small bronzes honoring the old Greco-Roman gods – Jupiter, Apollo, Tyche, and Serapis being among them. The persecutions subsided in AD 313, possibly as a result of concerns expressed by Constantine and Licinius, the emperors in the west.