|
OBV.: IMP
PROBVS P F AVG
Radiate bust left in imperial mantle, holding sceptre
surmounted by eagle.
REV.: CALLIOPE AVG
The muse Calliope standing right, playing large lyre
supported on a column.
Mintmark: // [Exergual line
only]
Weight:: 4.67 g.
Die axis: ?
Diameter: ?
Image provided courtesy of Dr. Hubert
Lanz, NUMISMATIK LANZ MÜNCHEN
Lanz Auction 100, November 20, 2000
Ex Harlan J. Berk, 91
The following appeared in its full and
unmodified form in a Harlan J. Berk auction
catalogue 91, June 1996,
re-published here with permission of the author Dr.
Curtis Clay, and Harlan
J. Berk Ltd.
THE MUSE CALLIOPE ON AN
EXTRAORDINARY ANTONINIANUS OF PROBUS.
The nine Muses, the goddesses presiding
over the different types of poetry and
over the arts and sciences, appeared on Roman coins on
only two occasions.
First, in order to illustrate and
advertise his own name, the senator Q. Pomponius
Musa placed all nine of the muses, plus their leader
Hercules, on the Republican
denarii that he struck as a moneyer c. 65 BC (Crawford 410). On these coins
the
individual muses are distinguished by their posture
and attributes and by the
symbols that appears behind the head of Apollo on the
obverse but they are not
named; Pomponius' cognomen MVSA, the Latin word for
Muse, appears as a
general designation alongside all of them. It is
curious that whereas Pomponius'
denarii for eight of the muses are scarce only, his
denarius for the remaining
Muse Erato is one of the most sought after rarities in
the Republican series.
Secondly, the muse of epic poetry alone,
Calliope, appeared with the legend
CALLIOPE AVG on an extremely rare antoninianus struck
by the emperor Probus
at the mint of Siscia. A coin of these types was first
described in 1791
by Tanini in his supplement to Banduri's corpus of
late Roman and Byzantine coins
(1718). Both Eckhel (1797) and Cohen (first edition
1865, second edition 1886)
knew the type only from Tanini; Eckhel called it
"singular in the extreme" and Cohen
valued it at 100 francs, an immense price for an
antoninianus of Probus, the
common types of which were then worth under one franc
a piece. Percy Webb too
knew Tanini's description only and no actual specimen
of this coins, so was unable to
attribute it to a specific mint and omitted it from
RIC V, 2 (1933). Probus' CALLIOPE
AVG antoninianus eluded even the Viennese collector
Missong, who specialized in
Probus and whose extraordinary collection of the coins
of that emperor was
acquired after his death by the national coin cabinet
in Vienna. However, according
to A. Alföldi's corpus of coins
struck by Probus at Siscia, which was published in
1939, two famous private collectors of the beginning
of this centurty, Francesco
Gnecchi and George Weifert, whose collections are now
at the Museo Nazionale in
Rome and the University of Belgrade respectively, were
each able to acquire a
a specimen of Probus' CALLIOPE AVG antoninianus, which
Alföldi attributed to the
mint of Siscia. The specimen shown here is thus
apparently only the third to
come to light since 1791, and the only one of the
three that does not reside
permanently in a museum collection. This coin is a
great deal rarer than Pomponius'
denarius of Erato, and it is the only Roman coin to
actually name one of the nine
Muses.
What was the reason for this brief and
isolated appearance of the muse of epic
poetry in an age of barbarian invasions and civil war
that might seem singularly
unsuited for the cultivation of literature? Eckhel
viewed the type as a general
tribute to Probus' excellence: Calliope may have been
placed on the coins, he said,
in order that she might seem to be sounding the praise
due to Probus' virtue. But it
seems preferable to suspect a more specific cause:
perhaps an author of the time
had actually published an epic poem celebrating
Probus' accomplishments, or could
it be that Probus himself composed epic poetry and
perhaps even sang his own
compositions while accompanying himself on the lyre,
like his infamous predecessor
Nero, more than two hundred years earlier? Literary
and especially histrionic
ambitions would not have made Probus popular with the
army and the Roman ruling
class, so it would be no surprise that the CALLIOPE
AVG type did not meet with
the emperor's approval and was immediately
discontinued. In any case, the type was
clearly experimental since it lacks the value and
officina marks that appear
on almost all other Siscian antoniniani of Probus.
For help in tracking down the literature
relating to this coin we are grateful
to Dr. William E. Metcalf of the American Numismatic
Society, Dr. Andrew Burnett
of the British Museum, Marcus Weder of Pratteln,
Switzerland and Mrs. Maria E. Clay.
|
|
|
