BEAUTIFUL WOMEN ON ANCIENT COINS

ANCIENT GREEKS AND Romans regarded their deities as having perfect human forms. Their gods were (mostly) divinely handsome, and their goddesses were supernaturally beautiful. When ancient coin engravers began to represent real men and women, they naturally followed the conventions of beauty long established by sculptors working in three dimensions and painters working in two.

What makes a face beautiful? This is a subject that has been intensively studied by social psychologists, as well as plastic surgeons. In general, Greco-Roman standards of beauty were much the same as those prevailing in our own time in the West, with the possible exception that ancients favored plumper cheeks–an indication of high status, in a world where only the elite were well fed.

Since beauty is in the eye of the beholder, the following is offered as a highly personal selection of beautiful women on ancient coins.

Lucilla

 

Lucilla. Augusta, AD 164-182. AV Aureus (18mm, 6.07 g, 12h). Rome mint. Struck under Marcus Aurelius and Lucius Verus, AD 161-162. LVCILL?E ?VG ?N TONINI ?VG F, draped bust right, hair waved and knotted low at back in chignon / VOT?/ PVBLI/C? •/ • in three lines within laurel wreath. Image: CNG.

Born about the year 149, Lucilla was the daughter of Emperor Marcus Aurelius and his remarkably fertile spouse, Faustina the Younger[10], who bore 14 children in 30 years of marriage. Lucilla's father was the Emperor Antoninus Pius (ruled 138-161 CE). Her charming portrait with a faint smile (unusual in Roman imperial portraiture) appears on a gold aureus dated to the first year of her husband's reign.

Plautilla

 

Aureus 202-205 (?), AV 7.28 g. PLAVTILLA – AVGVSTA Draped bust r. Rev. VENVS – VICTRIX Venus standing l., holding apple and palm branch and resting l. elbow on shield; to her r., Cupid standing l., holding helmet. Image: Numismatica Ars Classica.

Born about the year 185 CE to a distinguished elite family (the gens Fulvia), Plautilla married Emperor Caracalla in April 202. The marriage was not a happy one. When Plautilla's father, the commander of the Praetorian Guard, was executed in 205, Plautilla and her brother were exiled, treated harshly, and eventually strangled on orders of the demented emperor. Coins bearing Plautilla's portrait were mostly issued during the reign of her father-in-law Septimius Severus. A gold aureus in Plautilla's name bears an image of Venus and Cupid on the reverse.

The value of any ancient coin depends strongly on eye appeal – a quality that is difficult to define but that collectors know when they see it. In making a judgment about the beauty of long dead or even imaginary women depicted on ancient coins, what we are really evaluating is not so much the features of a face but rather the skill of the engraver in creating, on the surface of a small metal disc, a pleasing representation of a person.

To read the complete article, see:
Not Just a Pretty Face: 10 Beautiful Women on Ancient Coins (https://coinweek.com/not-just-a-pretty-face-10-beautiful-women-on-ancient-coins/)

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