Sale: Nomos 7, Lot: 190. Estimate CHF85000.  Closing Date: Tuesday, 14 May 2013.  Sold For CHF95000. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

Gordian III. AD 238-244. Medallion (Silver, 32mm, 22.90 g 1), with traces of an originally gilded surface, Rome, 241-243. IMP GORDIANVS PIVS FELIX AVG Laureate, draped and cuirassed bust of Gordian to left, with a visible mustache and long sideburns. Rev. AEQVITAS AVGVSTI The three Monetae standing facing, their heads to left, each holding a scale in her right hand over a pile of coins at her feet, and each holding a cornucopiae in her left. Cf. Cohen 30 (this type but in bronze). Cf. Cohen 31 = RIC 133 (similar but obverse bust to right). Extermely rare and of remarkably fine quality. Extremely fine.

Ex Nomos, TEFAF March 2011 Price List, 37.

Silver medals must have been issued in fairly considerable numbers by the Roman emperors, but virtually all of them were melted down into more convenient bullion by their recipients. The number that survive, of all the emperors who issued them, can not be more than a hundred.