Exceptional Portrait of Sabina

Triton XXI, Lot: 69. Estimate $4000. Sold for $4250. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

EGYPT, Alexandria. Hadrian, with Sabina. AD 117-138. BI Tetradrachm (24mm, 13.23 g, 12h). Dated RY 16 (AD 131/132). AVT KAI TPAI A∆PIA CЄB, laureate, draped, and cuirassed bust right of Hadrian / CABЄINA CЄBACTH, draped bust right of Sabina, wearing stephane (or perhaps her hair is pulled into a braid, almost like a diadem), her hair pulled into a queue down her neck; L Iς (date) across field. Köln 1041; Dattari (Savio) 1252 (this coin); K&G 32.515; RPC III 5788/11 (this coin); Emmett 886.16; Staffieri, Alexandria In Nummis 92 (this coin). EF, toned, a bit of porosity. Very rare bust type of Sabina on a Hadrian tetradrachm, with none appearing on CoinArchives.

From the Giovanni Maria Staffieri Collection, purchased from Dr. Piero Beretta, Milan, May 1972. Ex Dr. Piero Beretta Collection (Milan); Giovanni Dattari Collection, no. 1252.

This particular bust style for Sabina is very rare on tetradrachms issued by Hadrian, with his portrait on the obverse and Sabina’s on the reverse, but it is similar to the portrait on the issues that depict Sabina on the obverse with her enthroned on the reverse in the guise of Demeter (regnal year 15 of Hadrian).