|
Hadrian. AD 117-138. AV Aureus (20mm, 7.14 g, 12h). “Travel series” issue (“Provinces cycle”) – The province alone. Rome mint. Struck AD 132. HADRIANVS AVG COS III P P, bareheaded and draped bust left / NILVS, Nilus, naked to waist, reclining left, holding cornucopia in right hand and reed in left, resting left arm on sphinx; to left, hippopotamus standing right; below, in water, crocodile right. RIC II.3 1549 (same dies as illustration); Strack 3071/ζo; Beckmann, Gold, dies l3/N1; Calicó 1290 (same dies as illustration); BMCRE 855 (same dies); Biaggi 624 (same dies). Lustrous, a few hairlines. Near EF. Struck with dies of artistic merit.
From the PLZ Collection. Ex Classical Numismatic Group 120 (11 May 2022), lot 847.
As noted previously, Hadrian’s visit to Egypt began triumphantly but ended in tragedy, when his young favorite Antinoüs drowned in the Nile in AD 130. Despite this, Egypt retained a special place in the emperor’s heart, and is depicted in three distinct types on his famous Travel Series of coinage. Two different aureus types depict the Nile, with this example explicitly naming the great river, depicting its male personification reclining to left upon a crocodile, which in turn swims in the river’s waters. To the left is a hippopotamus, another of the Nile’s fauna. Nilus holds a fruit-bearing cornucopia, a symbol of Egypt since the Ptolemaic dynasty. On this example, Hadrian’s draped bust also faces to the left.
The two Nilus aureus issues are widely recognized as being struck some from the most beautifully engraved of all Hadrian's gold aurei die pairs with this example regarded as the finest reverse die for this type. A beautiful coin.
The final winners of all CNG Feature Auction 132 lots will be determined at the live online sale that will be held on 18-19 May 2026.
CNG Feature Auction 132 – Session One – Lot 1-318 will be held Monday morning, 18 May 2026 beginning at 9:00 AM 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.
|
