Published in Women of the Caesars

Triton XVIII, Lot: 1269. Estimate $5000. Sold for $10000. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

Galla Placidia. Augusta, AD 421-450. AV Solidus (20.5mm, 4.46 g, 6h). Uncertain Asian mint. Struck under Theodosius II, AD 443. GALLA PLA CIDIA AVG, pearl-diademed and draped bust right, wearing single-drop earring and pearl necklace, crowned by manus Dei above / IMP • XXXXII • COS XVII • P • P •, Constantinopolis, draped and wearing plumed helmet, enthroned left, left foot set on prow, holding globus cruciger in extended right hand and scepter in left; shield set on ground to right; star to left; COMOB. RIC X 305; Depeyrot 84/6 (Constantinople mint); Biaggi –; DOCLR 834 var. (different number of •’s); G. Giacosa, Women of the Caesars (Milan, 1977), pl. lxv (this coin). EF, some short scratches. Extremely rare late issue of this remarkable empress.

Ex Julius Caesar and His Legacy (Numismatic Fine Arts, 13 May 1991), lot 146; Numismatic Fine Arts XXII (1 June 1989), lot 163.

From the NFA catalogue: “The empress Galla Placidia had a most extraordinary career spanning the first half of the turbulent fifth century. Born about 388, she was the daughter of Theodosius the Great by his second wife Galla, and half-sister of Arcadius and Honorius. Taken prisoner by Alaric during the sack of Rome by the Visigoths in 410, she was eventually married to his successor, Ataulf. Following Ataulf’s death she was ransomed to the Romans for 600,000 measures of grain, and in 417 married the general Constantius by whom she had a son, the future emperor Valentinian III, and a daughter, Honoria. She acted as regent for the first twelve years of her son’s reign (425-437), but then gradually faded into the background as the political influence of the general Aetius increased. Her final years were devoted to the erection of sacred buildings in Ravenna, and her tomb, which contained also the remains of Honorius and Constantius III, is still to be seen in the city.

Coins honoring Galla Placidia were struck both in the western empire, under her son Valentinian III, and in the East by her nephew Theodosius II. She may already have held the rank of Augusta under Honorius, but if not she certainly received it in 424 when Valentinian was created Caesar. This attractive solidus, issued from an uncertain Asian mint, may be closely dated by Theodosius II’s titles which appear on the reverse. His forty-second imperatorial acclamation, corresponding to the years of his reign, covers the period 10 January 443 to 10 January 444, whilst the celebration of his eighteenth and final consulship on 1 January 444 indicates that the issue to which the present coin belongs had ceased before the end of the year 443. After the reign of Theodosius II the seated figure of Constantinopolis disappeared from the gold coinage of the eastern empire, not to be seen again until the reign of Justin II more than a century later.”