Sale: Triton VII, Lot: 863. Estimate $5000.  Closing Date: Monday, 12 January 2004.  Sold For $9200. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

NERO. 54-68 AD. Æ Sestertius (24.64 gm). Lugdunum (Lyon) mint. Struck circa 65 AD. NERO CLAVD CAESAR AVG GER P M TR P IMP P P, laureate head right, globe at point of bust / PACE P R TERRA MARIQ PARTA IANVM CLVSIT, S C across field, temple of Janus with garlanded and closed doors right. RIC I 438; WCN 419; BMCRE 319; cf. BN 131 (IMP NERO); Cohen 146. Choice EF, beautiful Tiber patina, hairline flan crack, light double strike on reverse. [See color enlargement on plate 14] ($5000)

Ex Numismatic Fine Arts XII (23-24 March 1983), lot 194, where it realized $7000.

The temple of Janus, the Roman god of beginnings and endings, was one of Rome’s most ancient centers of worship. It was said that Romulus had built it after he made peace with the Sabines, and that it was king Numa who decreed that its doors should be opened during times of war and shut during times of peace. In all of Roman history up until the reign of Nero the temple doors had been shut perhaps five or six times ­ once under king Numa (who originated the tradition), once at the end of the Second Punic War, three times under Augustus, and, according to Ovid, once under Tiberius.

In 65 AD, when peace had been generally established in the Empire, Nero understandably requested the closing of the temple’s doors. He marked the event with great celebrations and commemorated it by issuing a large and impressive series of coins. The inscription on this issue announces “the doors of Janus have been close after peace has been procured for the Roman People on the land and on the sea." Despite Nero’s contentment with affairs on the empire’s borders, the year 65 AD was rife with domestic tragedy: much of Rome was still in ashes from the great fire of the previous year, Nero narrowly escaped death in the Pisonian conspiracy, and not long afterward he kicked to death his pregnant wife Poppaea.