Type 55: Eros Flees from Psyche

Eros flees from Psyche, after she has discovered his identity. Only one city, Nicomedia in Bithynia, placed this motif on its coins.

* Nicomedia in Bithynia, coins of Maximus Caesar (not illustrated) on which Eros is shown fleeing l., while Psyche, kneeling l., tries to restrain him.

* On Italian local coinages of the Roman Republic, Eros is represented as bound to a pillar and awaiting punishment for his mistreatment of Psyche (Stannard, series 35a-c). There are also gemstones that must have served as amulets: “showing Eros bound to a column inscribed ΔIKAIΩC (justly), [they] are magical and are meant to punish the object of the unrequited love” (Schwartz, “Engraved gems”).  

CATALOGUE

Nicomedia / Maximus Caesar

Reference: RPC VI, 3477*

Rarity: RR

Type 54: Eros Embracing Psyche

The story of Eros and Psyche is told in the Golden Ass of Apuleius (second century A.D.). Sent by his jealous mother Aphrodite to punish the beautiful Psyche (“the soul”) by making her fall in love with some disgusting creature—a motif found again in Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream—Eros himself falls for her, and visits her every night, though without revealing himself to her. He warns her never to look at his face, or she will lose him forever. However, spurred on by her jealous sisters, she does precisely that, and the lovers are parted. To find out how the story continues, and whether it has a happy ending or not, the reader is invited to read Apuleius’s charming text, once described as “Shakespeare’s favourite novel” (Shakespeare also used Apuleius’s device of transformation into an ass). Here is a link to Patricia Lawrence’s page on Eros and Psyche on her Opera Nobilia website.  

There are many surviving representations of the lovers in ancient art, including the statuary groups in the Altes Museum, Berlin (centre) and the Capitoline Museum, Rome (left), Roman copies of Hellenistic originals. Normally Eros is on the left, but this little first century A.D. terracotta from Olbia on the Black Sea (in the National Museum in Poznań, Poland) has the positions reversed (right).

The provincial mints that illustrated the embrace of Eros and Psyche were Serdica in Thracia and Patrae in Achaea. 

* Serdica in Thracia, coins of Septimius Severus and Caracalla, all of them rare. Although most cataloguers have not made the distinction, there are actually two reverse types: (A) Eros r. and Psyche l. in close embrace, with a burning altar behind Eros, and (B) Eros r. and Psyche l. in an arm’s length embrace. The coin listed by Mionnet (I, 369) could be either. 

Small Æ, 3.05 g. [Obv. AY K M CEYEPOC.Laureate head of Septimius Severus r.] Rev. CEPΔΩN. Reverse type A (Photo courtesy of Lübke & Wiedemann KG).

Æ 19, 2 h, 3.56 g. [Obv. ...ANTΩNEINO.. Laureate (?), draped bust of Caracalla r.] Rev. CEPΔΩN. Reverse type A, from identical reverse die as the coin of Septimius Severus.

Æ 31, 1 h, 14.97 g. Obv. AYT K M AYP CEYH ANTΩNEINOC. Laureate bust of Caracalla r. Rev. OYΛΠIAC CEPΔIKHC. Reverse type B (Photos courtesy of Classical Numismatic Group, Inc., www.cngcoins.com).

Æ 30, 1 h, 15.73 g. Similar, reverse type B, enlargement of reverse below.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Æ 17, 1 h, 3.55 g. Obv. AYT K M AY CEY ANTΩNEINOC or similar. Laureate bust of Caracalla r. Rev. CEP>ΔΩN. Reverse type B, but with Eros’s bow and quiver behind him. 

 

 

 

Æ 20, 1 h, 4.03 g, but with antique silver mount.

* Patrae in Achaea, coins of Commodus (not illustrated) showing Eros and Psyche embracing. Their pose (facing, but with their upper bodies half turned towards each other to enable the embrace) is closer to that of the statuary groups than is the case with the Serdica coins.


 





* Here is a mosaic from Roman Corduba in Spain showing the lovers in a more dramatic embrace.



 






 






* To my knowledge, there is no provincial coin that definitely shows Eros with Psyche as a butterfly, as on the following Roman cornelian intaglio (photo courtesy of ACR Auctions).






 










or on this mosaic from the National Museum in Sofia,
 

withe the possible exception of a coin from Aphrodisias (see Type 09).

 

 

 

 

* This reverse type also appears on crude pseudo-aurei of the Germanic tribes (aurum barbarorum) with obverse type of bust of Heracles (photo courtesy of Leu Numismatik). 

 

 

 

 

 

 

CATALOGUE

Serdica / Septimius Severus (type A, small module)

Previously unpublished?

Rarity: RRR

Serdica / Caracalla (type A, small module)

Previously unpublished? 
Rarity: RRR

Serdica / Caracalla (type B, large module)

References: Hristova/Jekov 12.18.16.1; Varbanov 2311-12

Rarity: Scarce

Serdica / Caracalla (type B, small module)

References: Hristova/Jekov 12.18.16.2; Varbanov 2081 
Rarity: R

Patrae / Commodus
Reference: RPC IV, 1, 10968*
Rarity: RR

A Victorian jet gem of Eros with Psyche.

Type 53: Hero and Leander

One of the most romantic of the Greek legends is that of Hero of Sestus and her lover Leander of Abydus. Separated from each other not only by social convention (Hero was a virgin priestess of Aphrodite) but also by the choppy waters of the Hellespont (the Dardanelles), Leander would swim across to her at night, guided by a lamp, and then swim back again. One night, the lamp was blown out by the wind, and Leander drowned. When Hero saw his body the next morning she threw herself into the sea and perished.

The tale of the doomed lovers has continued to exert a certain fascination. In the late sixteenth century, Christopher Marlowe wrote a homoerotically charged poem about the story:

His body was as straight as Circe’s wand;

Jove might have sipt out nectar from his hand,

Even as delicious meat is to the tast,

So was his neck in touching, and surpast

The white of Pelops’ shoulder: I could tell ye,

 How smooth his breast was, and how white his belly; etc.

In 1810, Lord Byron became the first person in modern times known to have swum across, commenting afterwards that “the immediate distance is not above a mile but the current renders it hazardous, so much so, that I doubt whether Leander’s conjugal powers must not have been exhausted in his passage to Paradise”.

Today there is an annual swimming race across the Hellespont, for which all shipping in the sea-lane is temporarily (and no doubt expensively) halted.  

It is hardly surprising that the two cities of Sestus in Thracia and Abydus in Troas should have issued coins to celebrate the legend, though there has been discussion among numismatists about why they should have been issued by certain rulers and not by others. Martin Price speculated that the Commodus issue in Abydus celebrated the imperial betrothal to Crispina in the year 177, but taking into account how ill-fated the lovers were known to be this would have been tactless and therefore most unlikely. Another theory is that the issues were connected with notable imperial crossings of the Hellespont, for instance in the context of military campaigns. Admittedly, Maximinus is not known to have made the crossing; however, given how troubled his short reign was, the coins struck in Abydus might well have reflected wishful thinking on the part of its frightened citizens, who, “ever fearful of Eastern aggression, anticipated a campaign by Maximinus to secure the eastern borders” (Mark Fox, “Hero and Leander”, in The Numismatist, September 2014, pp.59-61). 

* Sestus in Thracia, coins of Caracalla (not illustrated) and Severus Alexander. Leander, his clothes and sword on a rock behind him, is shown swimming r. through the sea, in which fish can be seen, towards Hero standing l. in her tower, holding out an oil-lamp that is being lit by Eros, flying r., from his torch. For a detailed coverage of these coins, see Mark Fox’s forthcoming catalogue of the coinage of Sestus in the Roman period.

13.49 g. Obv. AY • K M A[Y C]E • AΛEΞANΔPOC. Laureate, draped and cuirassed bust of Severus Alexander r.  Rev. [C]HCTIΩN. As described above. - Varbanov 2987 (Photos courtesy of Lübke & Wiedemann KG).

 



Æ 27, 2 h, 9.70 g. Similar (Photos courtesy of Roma Numismatics)..






* Abydus in Troas, coins of Commodus (not illustrated), Caracalla, Severus Alexander and Maximinus I. Similar reverse type as for Sestus. Notice the mixture of Latin and Greek legends on the coins of Severus Alexander.

Æ 38, 6 h, 26.29 g. Obv. AY KAI M AYPH ANTΩNEINOC. Laureate, draped and cuirassed bust of Caracalla r. Rev. ABYΔHNΩN HPΩ, in ex. ΛAIANΔPOC. As described above (Photos courtesy of Classical Numismatic Group, Inc., www.cngcoins.com).

25.78 g. Obv. IMP CIA AVIP SEV ALEXANDRO AVG. Laureate, draped and cuirassed bust of Severus Alexander r. Rev. ABYΔHNΩ, N in ex. As described above. - Münzen & Medaillen GmbH, auction 40, 354 (Photos courtesy of Münzen & Medaillen GmbH).

 

 

 

Æ 33, 7 h, 22.83 g. Similar. 

Æ 36, 21.09 g. Obv. AYΓ IOY OYH MAΞIMEINOC. Laureate draped bust of Maximinus I r. Rev. ABYΔHNΩ[N]. As described above. - Günther Schlüter, Hero und Leander auf den antiken Münzen von Abydos und Sestos, p.67, no.19.

CATALOGUE

Sestus / Caracalla
Reference: SNG Fitzwilliam 1787

Rarity: Scarce

Sestus / Severus Alexander

Reference: RPC VI, 1139*

Rarity: RR

Abydus / Commodus

Reference: RPC IV, 2, 30*
Rarity: RRR

Abydus / Caracalla

Previously unpublished?

Rarity: RRR

Abydus / Severus Alexander

Reference: RPC VI, 3909*

Rarity: Scarce

Abydus / Maximinus I

Reference:  RPC VI, 3932*

Rarity: RRR