Portraiture Debated

Sale: Triton XIII, Lot: 7. Estimate $2000.  Closing Date: Monday, 4 January 2010.  Sold For $2600. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

SPAIN, Punic Spain. Circa 237-209 BC. AR Shekel (7.10 g, 12h). Bare male head left / Horse standing right; palm tree in background, retrograde yod before. Cf. MHC 254-6; Robinson, Punic 7h var. (letter not retrograde); CNH 83 var. (same); SNG BM Spain 122 var. (same). VF, some porosity and roughness, slight die shift on reverse. Rare.

In his 1956 article on the Punic coins of Spain, Robinson noted that this issue, which he placed at Carthago Nova, had two distinct styles of obverse portrait, which he called ‘Punic’ and ‘Roman,’ respectively. Robinson thought that the latter style, seen on the present coin, belonged to the period after the Romans captured the city in 209 BC, and that the obverse shows the portrait of Scipio Africanus. His view of this coinage has not been adopted by later scholars, who maintain that the entire issue, of both portrait styles, belongs to the Punic period. While the ‘Roman’ portrait style is distinct in character, there is no evidence beyond speculation to date any of this issue to the Roman period at Carthago Nova or elsewhere in Spain.