349, Lot: 378. Estimate $100. Sold for $260. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

Claudius. AD 41-54. Æ Sestertius (34mm, 27.51 g, 7h). Imitating a Rome mint issue of circa AD 41-50. Uncertain mint in the Rhineland(?). Laureate head right; two countermarks: both TI AV within rectangular incuse / Spes advancing left, holding flower and raising hem of skirt. Cf. RIC I 99; for countermark: Pangerl –. Fair, brown surfaces; countermarks are VF.

From the Estate of Wayne C. Phillips; Ex Jörg Müller Collection (Classical Numismatic Group Electronic Auction 219, 30 September, 2009), lot 432.

D.W. MacDowell and A.V.M. Hubrecht discuss the countermarked bronzes from the Rhineland in “Countermarks on the Aes of Claudius from Nijmegen,” Proceedings of the XIth International Numismatic Congress, Vol. 2, pp. 265-7. There appear to be three distinct variations of the TI AV countermark. One appears solely on asses of Agrippa, and is probably contemporary with the reign of Tiberius. The other two are found on aes of Caligula and Claudius, and are localized in Upper Germany and the lower Rhine. MacDowell and Hubrecht conclude that the countermarks at Nijmegen were applied to lightweight products of a local mint, and indicated that the coins were to be accepted at the full weight standard of the Rome mint issues struck under Tiberius (hence the countermark, TI[berius] AV[gustus]).