320, Lot: 315. Estimate $200. Sold for $425. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

SYRIA, Coele-Syria. Heliopolis. Valerian I. AD 253-260. Æ (29mm, 16.41 g, 6h). Struck circa AD 256/7. Laureate, draped, and cuirassed bust right / Three prize crowns, each containing two palm fronds; CERT • SACR •/CAP • OEC •/ISE • HEL • in three lines in exergue. Sawaya 636-642 var. (D100/R– [unlisted rev. die]); BMC 30 corr. (under Gallienus). VF, black patina with light earthen deposits, minor roughness.

Many cities throughout the eastern portion of the Roman Empire periodicially held smaller versions of the four Iselastic Games of Greece (so called because victors in the ceremonies were granted iselasticum, the right to reenter their native cities in triumph following the games) – the Pythian, Olympian, Isthmian, and Nemean. Like the Greek originals, these smaller versions included a number of athletic contests, as well as music and poetry competitions. Often such events were associated with important civic cults of each city. At Heliopolis (modern Baalbek), the site of a massive temple complex dedicated to Jupiter-Zeus-Baal-Hadad, Venus-Aphrodite-Astarte, and Bacchus-Dionysus, these games were known as the Certamina Sacra Capitolia Oecumenica Iselastica Heliopolitana (the “Sacred Capitoline Ecumenical Iselastic Games of Helipolis”). Here, celebrations were held in honor of Jupiter-Zeus-Baal-Hadad, not only associating this god with his counterpart at Rome, but also the city with the Empire as a whole.