169, Lot: 192. Estimate $100. Sold for $262. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

Sextus Pompey. 43-42 BC. Æ As (30mm, 22.49 g). Spanish or Sicilian mint. Eppius, legate. Laureate head of Janus; I above / [EP]PIVS above, LEG below, prow of galley right. Crawford 478/1b; CRI 234a; Sydenham 1045a; BMCRR (Spain) 108; Martini, Sextus Pompeius Em. II, Serie C, 184 (D13/R30). Fine, brown patina, some encrustation.

From the J. S. Wagner Collection.

The legate Marcus Eppius was a stalwart supporter of the Pompeian cause, first in North Africa where he had struck an issue of denarii (CRI 44) and later in Spain with Pompey’s son Gnaeus, where he survived the battles of Thapsus and Munda (46-45 BC). Traditionally assigned to Spain before the collapse of the Pompeian cause there, Martini argues for a contrary view, that the Eppius asses were struck in Sicily after Sextus retreated to that island sanctuary. He cites the Morgantina excavations, where 25 Eppius asses were recovered, along with 192 Pompey type asses (Buttrey Morgantina 691-692). That ratio would still support the argument that the Eppius asses were remnants brought to Sicily by the Pompeian refugees from Spain. Alternately, the two varieties of Eppius asses, with altar between the heads and obverse legend, and without (CRI 234, 234a), might reflect two distinct issues, one from Spain, one from Sicily.