The Certamina Sacra Capitolia Oecumenica Iselastica Heliopolitana

455, Lot: 237. Estimate $100. Sold for $110. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

COELESYRIA, Heliopolis. Valerian I. AD 253-260. Æ (27mm, 10.82 g, 5h). Certamina Sacra Capitolia Oecumenica Iselastica Heliopolitana Games Issue. 8th emission, AD 256/7. Laureate, draped, and cuirassed bust right / Prize crown, containing two palm fronds, set on ground line. Sawaya 848-50 (D111/R300; listed as Valerian II). Green patina with some light earthen highlights/deposits, small metal flaw on obverse, pit on the reverse. VF.

Ex Dr. George Spradling Collection (Classical Numismatic Group Electronic Auction 347, 25 March 2015), lot 405.

Many cities throughout the eastern portion of the Roman Empire periodically held smaller versions of the four Iselastic Games of Greece (so called because victors in the ceremonies were granted iselasticum, the right to reenter their native cities in triumph following the games) – the Pythian, Olympian, Isthmian, and Nemean. Like the Greek originals, these smaller versions included a number of athletic contests, as well as music and poetry competitions. Often such events were associated with important civic cults of each city. At Heliopolis (modern Baalbek), the site of a massive temple complex dedicated to Jupiter-Zeus-Baal-Hadad, Venus-Aphrodite-Astarte, and Bacchus-Dionysus, these games were known as the Certamina Sacra Capitolia Oecumenica Iselastica Heliopolitana (the “Sacred Capitoline Ecumenical Iselastic Games of Heliopolis”). Here, celebrations were held in honor of Jupiter-Zeus-Baal-Hadad, not only associating this god with his counterpart at Rome, but also the city with the Empire as a whole.