Third and Finest Known for Variety // ADVENTVI AVG IVDAEAE

Sale: Triton X, Lot: 626. Estimate $10000.  Closing Date: Monday, 8 January 2007.  Sold For $18000. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

Hadrian. AD 117-138. Æ Sestertius (27.08 g, 12h). Rome mint. Struck circa AD 134/5-138. HADRIANVS AVG COS III P P, laureate and draped bust right / ADVENTVI AVG IVDAEAE, S C in exergue, Hadrian standing right, raising right hand, facing Judaea standing left, holding patera in right hand and cup in left, at her feet, two small boys before her, one behind her, each holding a palm frond; between them, lit altar, behind which is a sacrificial bull lying left. RIC II 893 var. (no bull); Strack 752; Banti 43; cf. Hendin 798; BMCRE 1657 var. (same); Cohen 51. VF, green patina with hues of brown, minor porosity. Extremely rare variety with bull, apparently the third and finest known.

Banti records only one example, lot 271 from the Glendining sale of 19 May 1964 (recently sold as lot 840 in Leu 86 [5 May 2003]). Cohen’s listing includes the type with and without the bull. It is uncertain, though, whether a specimen with the bull actually resides in the BN collection.