Triton XXI, Lot: 258. Estimate $4000. Sold for $4250. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

EGYPT, Alexandria. Maximianus. First reign, AD 286-305. Potin Octadrachm(?) (23mm, 7.64 g, 12h). Without a date, but struck circa May/June–September/October AD 298. MAΞIMI ANOC CЄB, radiate head right / C ЄPAΠIC CωTHP (‘Serapis [the] Savior’), draped bust of Sarapis right, wearing ornate kalathos. Köln –; Dattari (Savio) 10692 (this coin); K&G –; Emmett 4167 (R5 – this coin cited); Staffieri, “Testimonianze sulla fine della monetazione autonoma alessandrina (296-298 d.C),” Proceedings of the XIII International Numismatic Congress (Madrid, 2005), pp. 937-45, Fig. 4 (this coin); Staffieri, Alexandria In Nummis 270 (this coin). EF, wonderful dark brown patina with traces of silvering showing through. Extremely rare. Only three examples are known: a specimen sold in Numismatica Ars Classica AG 51, lot 411; this coin, which is Dattari 10692; and Dattari 10693.

From the Giovanni Maria Staffieri Collection, purchased from Renzo Canavesi, Sagno, 1996. Ex Renzo Canavesi Collection (Sagno); Giuseppe Nascia Collection (Milan); Giovanni Dattari Collection, no. 10692.

The companion coin to the previous lot. It is interesting to compare these two coins to the Potin ‘Octodrachm’ of Domitius Domitianus, and speculate that the Domitianus coin influenced these two rare ‘trial’ pieces or vice versa.