We have recently published additional gallery sets for the following categories:
Cities visited by St Paul
Popes
Venice
As always, the most recent additions to the collection can be viewed in a dedicated online gallery.
We hope the growing set of galleries for various subsets from the collection will be of value to researchers, students and teachers.
In some cases, we do not yet have photographs of every item in the gallery, but these will be added as soon as possible.
CCCRH recently acquired a brass coin minted at Mytilene on the island of Lesbos during the reign of the Roman emperor Tiberius (14–37 CE). It has the head of Tiberius on the obverse with a Greek inscription meaning “Tiberius, divine Augustus.” On the reverse, there is the bust of Tiberius’ mother, Livia—also known as Julia—with a Greek inscription meaning “Julia, divine Augusta.” On both sides, there are the letters MYTI for “Mytilene.”
The coin provides evidence of the tendency in the eastern parts of the Roman Empire to declare that the emperor was divine, well before the more conservative authorities in Rome would embrace such an affirmation. The Roman Senate had posthumously deified Augustus (the stepfather of Tiberius) at the request of Tiberius. However, Tiberius had refused to nominate Livia for similar honours. Her divine status on the reverse of this coin indicates the city of Mytilene had issued it without the consent of Tiberius. Livia would eventually be deified by her grandson, Claudius.
The identification of the city is another interesting aspect of this coin. When minted around 35 CE, the coin preserved the older form of the city’s name: Mytilene (Μυτιλήνη). A later variant Mitylene (Μιτυλήνη), with the first two vowels reversed—also attested in Josephus, Antiquities, 15.350 & 16:20—is found in Acts 20:14 when describing a visit to the city by St Paul in 57 CE. Josephus was writing late in the first century. The Acts of the Apostles seems to have been partly inspired by the success of Josephus’ project and—for this reason—is dated no earlier than Josephus and perhaps somewhat later. The use of the later form of the city’s name in Acts 20 suggests that the author of the “we” material in Acts (16:10–17; 20:5–15; 21:1–18; 27:1–28:16) might not actually have been a companion of Paul during his travels.
Although this coin is very worn, it demonstrates the importance of primary source material in historical studies.
The Centre for Coins, Culture and Religious History has recently acquired a rare silver tetradrachm issued during the reign of the Roman emperor Tiberius (reigned 14–37 CE). There are only 4 known specimens of this coin and this is the finest of them.
The head of Tiberius is on the obverse. On the reverse, Zeus is seated on a throne holding Nike on his hand. There is no indication on the coin when or where it was minted, but it was most likely somewhere in northern Syria or Cilicia. In The Syro-Phoenician Tetradrachms and their Fractions, published in 2000, Michel and Karin Prieur considered that it was minted in Antioch.
The CCCRH specimen is unusual in that nearly all the Greek letters are visible, and the two monograms on the reverse are clearly shown. On the examples in Prieur (#31), McAlee (#213) and Roman Provincial Coinage (#4110), the monograms were incorrectly identified as M and H. Apart from being very clear in our example, the wording of the Greek inscription on this coin is particularly significant.
The obverse legend reads ΤΙΒΕΡΙΟΥ ΚΑΙΣΑΡΟΣ ΘΕΟΥ ΣΕΒΑΣΤΟΥ, while on the reverse we find: ΥΙΟΥ ΣΕΒΑΣΤΟΝ. This translates into English as “of Tiberius Caesar, divine Augustus / son of Augusti.” Presumably, the Augusti were Octavian and Livia, but the legend clearly states that Tiberius was divine.
While the imperial cult had developed rapidly in the eastern provinces of the early Roman Empire, such claims to divine status would have been objectionable to the Jewish diaspora communities in Antioch, Tarsus or other major cities in the area. Indeed, the Maccabean Revolt (c. 165 BCE) was triggered at least in part by the harsh enforcement of similar claims by the Seleucid king, Antiochus IV Epiphanes.
It is unknown whether Jewish objections to this coin of Tiberius influenced Roman policy, but, significantly, the word ΘΕΟΥ (god) is absent from similar coins issued by his immediate successors: Caligula (37–41 CE) and Claudius (41–54 CE). Due to its date during the life of Jesus (who was crucified in 30 CE), its provenance (Antioch) and its explicit attribution of divinity to Tiberius, this coin illustrates the political theology of the Roman Empire promoted on coins such as the so-called “Tribute Penny” shown to Jesus in Mark 12:15 and parallels.
The Australasian Coin and Banknote Magazine ceased publication in November 2022. The masthead has since been acquired by Imperial Group and will be relaunched in March 2023 as The Australian Coin Review (ACR).
The two final articles contributed to CAB by Dr Peter Lewis are now available on the CCCRH website:
November 2022 – Some thoughts on Becker’s Holey Dollar reproductions
October 2022 – Giovanni Boccaccio
There was a member-generated session on the identification of the site of ancient Bethsaida/Julias during the ASOR 2022 Annual Meeting in Boston. Here is a link to a video recording of the presentation on the Hellenistic and Early Roman coins from Et-Tell by Dr Gregory C. Jenks in his capacity as Coin Curator for the Bethsaida Excavations Project:
The Foundation recently acquired a rare and important pamphlet entitled To the Friends of the Constitution relating to the French Revolution. It consists of ten pages written in French by Pierre-Louis Couedic and printed in 1791 in Paris by Nicolas-Leger Moutard.
The French Revolution is considered to have begun with the storming of the Bastille in 1789 and ended with Napoleon’s coup d’etat in 1799. The document will be the centre-piece in an exhibition about the French Revolution that will be available to schools and other organizations. The display includes coins and banknotes and will be particularly interesting to students learning French and their teachers. Research Associate, Dr Peter Lewis, will be available to explain the display and run through the PowerPoint presentation with the teachers if required.
Couedic was a member of the Jacobin club, the most influential political group in Paris. The king, Louis XVI, had been caught trying to flee from France, but Couedic wanted him to continue as a constitutional monarch. He proposed that a council of citizens be established to act as guardians of the constitution.