The Aqua Traiana

349, Lot: 403. Estimate $150. Sold for $280. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

Trajan. AD 98-117. Æ As (28mm, 12.05 g, 6h). Rome mint. Struck AD 111. Laureate bust right, slight drapery / Genius of the Aqua Traiana reclining left under arched grotto supported by two columns, holding reed and leaning on urn from which water flows; AQVA/TRAIANA in two lines in exergue. RIC II 463; Woytek 361b-2. VF, green patina. The rarest of the three bronze denominations to use this type.

From the J. S. Wagner Collection.

The Aqua Traiana was dedicated in AD 109 and supplied water to the expanding trans-Tiber (west bank) suburbs of Rome. The coin depicts the castellum, or waterworks, associated with the terminal of the aqueduct, and its statue of the river Tiber.