Catalog
See full images - free registration
Continue with Google - no registration!
or register with email
Why register? Just to keep bots out of our catalog. Your email stays private - we will never share it or send you anything uninvited. We guarantee you that!
Æ20 Legend on obverse
| Issuer | Aesernia |
|---|---|
| Year | 263 BC - 240 BC |
| Type | Log in to see details |
| Value | Log in to see details |
| Currency | Log in to see details |
| Composition | Log in to see details |
| Weight | 6.98 g |
| Diameter | Log in to see details |
| Thickness | Log in to see details |
| Shape | Log in to see details |
| Technique | Log in to see details |
| Orientation | Log in to see details |
| Engraver(s) | Log in to see details |
| In circulation to | Log in to see details |
| Reference(s) | Log in to see details |
| Obverse description | Laureate head of Apollo (Apulu) facing left, rendered in archaic Italic style. The ethnic legend AISERNINO appears before the face in the field, with a control letter or symbol occasionally present behind the head. The portraiture reflects the influence of Greek coinage on the Samnite monetary tradition of the Oscan-speaking community of Aesernia. |
|---|---|
| Obverse script | Log in to see details |
| Obverse lettering | Log in to see details |
| Reverse description | Log in to see details |
| Reverse script | Latin |
| Reverse lettering | Log in to see details |
| Edge | Log in to see details |
| Mint | Log in to see details |
| Mintage | Log in to see details |
| Additional information |
Aesernia — modern Isernia in Molise — was a Latin colony founded by Rome in 263 BC, the same year this coinage begins. The timing is not coincidental. Colonial coinages of this type were struck to pay labor, soldiers, and local contractors during the foundational years of a new settlement, not as a civic expression of independence. The colony sat astride the Via Latina at a strategically sensitive point during Rome's consolidation of Samnite territory following the Third Samnite War.
The series is well-documented across the major reference works but survives in genuinely small numbers.