Extremely Rare Issue of Dryantilla

Sale: Triton XII, Lot: 743. Estimate $7500.  Closing Date: Monday, 5 January 2009.  Sold For $7500. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

Dryantilla. Wife of Regalianus (Usurper), AD 260. AR Antoninianus (3.21 g, 1h). Carnuntum mint. Struck circa AD 260. SVLP DRY[ANTILLA AVG], draped bust right, wearing stephane, set on crescent / [IVNO]NI REGINE, Juno standing left, holding patera in right hand and scepter in left. RIC IV 2; MIR 43, 1722 (same obv. die as illustration); RSC 1. Good VF. Overstruck on a denarius of Julia Domna, whose bust can be seen on the reverse. Extremely rare.

From the Gordon S. Parry Collection. Ex Classical Numismatic Group 40 (4 December 1996), lot 1673; Dr. John Jacobs Collection (Superior, 13 August 1995), lot 966; Numismatic Fine Arts XX (9 March 1988), lot 411.

Sulpicia Dryantilla was the wife of of the usurper Regalianus. Little is known about her, other than that she was the daughter of Sulpicius Pollio, an officer and senator under Caracalla, and Claudia Ammiana Dryantilla, a possible descendent of the Lycian senator Claudius Dryantianus. Shortly after her husband’s usurpation, she was given the title of Augusta. She was most likely killed along with her husband following his defeat.