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!
AR24 - Philip I L - Ϛ
| Issuer | Alexandria (Egypt) |
|---|---|
| Year | 248-249 |
| 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 | Log in to see details |
| 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) | Köln 2791; Dattari 4966; Milne 3759; Emmett 3492 |
| Obverse description | Diademed and draped bust of Otacilia Severa facing right, rendered in the Alexandrian provincial style. The empress wears a diadem in her elaborately dressed hair and a draped garment over the shoulder. The Greek legend runs around the bust within a beaded border. The portrait displays the typical thick-relief, somewhat stylised craftsmanship characteristic of third-century Alexandrian tetradrachm coinage. |
|---|---|
| Obverse script | Log in to see details |
| Obverse lettering | Log in to see details |
| Reverse description | Standing figure of Elpis (Hope) advancing to the left in full-length robes, raising the hem of her skirt with her left hand and holding a flower or blossom upward in her right hand. The regnal year date appears divided in the field to either side of the figure, with L (the Egyptian year sign) to the left and Ϛ (the numeral six, indicating regnal year 6 of Philip I) to the right. The composition is enclosed within a beaded border. |
| Reverse script | Log in to see details |
| 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 |
Philip I celebrated the Ludi Saeculares in 248 AD — Rome's thousandth anniversary games — with unprecedented spectacle, including the display of exotic animals gathered from across the empire. The Alexandrian mint, operating under the Roman prefect of Egypt, struck this issue in regnal year six (L Ϛ) as part of the broader provincial coinage synchronized with that milestone year. Egypt's billon tetradrachms circulated within a closed currency system; they could not legally leave the province, which is why survival rates from hoards found outside Egypt remain negligible.