115, Lot: 372. Estimate $300. Sold for $185. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

NERO. 54-68 AD. Æ Sestertius (34mm, 22.81 gm). Lugdunum Lyon) mint. Struck circa 65 AD. Laureate head left, small globe at point of bust / Ceres seated left, holding grain ears in right hand and torch in left, facing Annona who stands right holding cornucopia; between them is a modius set on an altar and a ship's stern. RIC I 431; WCN 423; BMCRE 307; Cohen 15. Near VF, glossy green patina with some silvering on the portrait, fields smoothed, details lightly strengthened, center of obverse flattened by abrasion.

The reverse type depicting Annona and Ceres, the goddesses of annual produce and agriculture, is a general allusion to Rome's grain supply. Since Rome was unable to feed itself from its immediate neighborhood and had to depend on grain mainly from North Africa and Sicily, the shipment of grain was a matter of the greatest importance. The issuance of this coin was propaganda intended to boost public confidence in the grain supply, as was the coin with the Port of Ostia reverse.