|
TROAS, Antandrus. Caracalla. AD 198-217. Æ (34mm, 22.39 g, 7h). Dionysios, strategos for the second time. Laureate, draped, and cuirassed bust right / Aeneas advancing right, head left, leading Ascanius by the hand, and holding Anchises on his shoulder; prow of galley to right. C. Fontana, “Note su alcune monete inedite o poco conosciute della serie urbica greca coniate durante l’Impero Romano” in RIN 1967, 18 (this coin). Yellow-brown surfaces, porosity. Near VF. Unique.
Ex Classical Numismatic Group 43 (24 September 1997), lot 964.
According to Vergil (Aeneid, Book 2), Aeneas, the son of the goddess Venus and the Trojan Anchises, fled with some remnants of the inhabitants of Troy as it fell to the Greeks, taking with him his son, Ascanius, his elderly father, Anchises, and the Palladium, or ancient sacred statue of Athena. The Trojans eventually made their way west to resettle in Italy. There they intermarried with the local inhabitants and founded the town of Lavinium, and thereby became the nucleus of the future Roman people. One of the descendants of Aeneas’ son Ascanius (known now as Iulus) was Rhea Silvia. Impregnated by the god Mars, she gave birth to the twins, Romulus and Remus. Exposed by their great-uncle, Amulius, the twins were suckled by a she-wolf, until they were eventually rescued. Romulus later founded the city of Rome, and consequently the image of the she-wolf and the twins became the symbol of the city. The mythological depictions on this coin reinforce the importance of Ilium, not only as the seedbed of the future Roman people, but also as the mother city of the future caput mundi.
The final winners of all CNG Feature Auction 127 lots will be determined during the live online sale that will be held on 17-18 September 2024. This lot is in Session Two, which will begin 17 September at 2 PM ET.
Winning bids are subject to a 22.5% buyer's fee for bids placed on this website and 25% for all others.
We recognize that our users may have various Internet Browsers and Operating Systems. We like our visitors to have the best possible experience when using our bidding platform. However, we do recognize that it is impossible to develop applications that work identically, efficiently and effectively on all web browsers. The CNG bidding platform supports the latest stable major version and stable previous version of Chrome and Firefox.
|
