CNG 84, Lot: 931. Estimate $500. Sold for $725. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

P. Cornelius Lentulus Marcellinus. 50 BC. AR Denarius (18mm, 4.01 g, 7h). Rome mint. Bare head of M. Claudius Marcellus right; triskeles behind / M. Claudius Marcellus advancing right, carrying trophy into tetrastyle temple. Crawford 439/1; Sydenham 1147; Claudia 11. Good VF, minor obverse porosity.

This moneyer, presumably the quaestor of 48 BC, here honors his most famous ancestor, the holder of five consulships and one of the principal Roman heroes of the Second Punic War. The triskeles alludes to his conquest of Sicily in 212-210 BC, the spoils from which rescued the state from imminent bankruptcy. The reverse type commemorates his spolia opima, the arms won in 222 BC when, as consul, he slew an Insubrian chieftain with his own hands in the course of the Roman conquest of Cisalpine Gaul.