Goldberg Coins and Collectibles



Sale 108
 
Lot 209

Hadrian. Æ As (13.18 g), AD 117-138. Rome, AD 134-138. HADRIANVS AVG COS III P P, laureate and draped bust of Hadrian right. Rev. ADVENTV-I AVG IV]DAEAE, S C in exergue, emperor standing right, extending hand towards Judaea standing left, holding patera in and cup; at her feet, two children before her, one behind, each holding a palm branch; between the emperor and Judaea, a lit altar. Cf. Hendin 1606 (only two children on reverse); RIC 893; cf. BMC 1661. Extremely Rare. Light brown patina. Very Fine. Estimate Value $7,500 - UP
From the S. Moussaieff Collection, This lot has been officially exported from Israel through the Israel Antiquities Authority.
This copper as of Hadrian belongs to that emperor's popular "travel series" which commemorated his visits to various provinces throughout the Empire, including Hispania, Macedonia, and Egypt among others. This particular issue celebrates a visit to Judaea. On the reverse, the togate emperor greets the female personification of Judaea, who offers a sacrifice in his honor and is surrounded by three children holding palm branches. The amicable relationship between Hadrian and Judaea expressed by the type belies the deep crisis that unfolded in the province under Hadrian.

In AD 130, Hadrian passed through Judaea on his way to Egypt. During this trip he saw the ruins of Jerusalem left from the destruction of the city by Titus in AD 70 and vowed to rebuild it as the capital of the province. As a philhellene and respecter of antiquity, Hadrian was generally concerned with the upkeep of the old cities of the Empire. Unfortunately, he decided not to restore the city as a Jewish religious center, but rather as a pagan capital dedicated to the cult of Jupiter Capitolinus and renamed as Aelia Capitolina. It is not entirely clear whether this refoundation was really intended by Hadrian as an affront to Jewish sensibilities or rather as a misguided attempt to bring Judaea into the Hellenic cultural oikeumene that the emperor was constructing throughout the Greek East. The Seleukid king Antiochos IV Epiphanes (175-164 BC) had courted disaster with similar attempts to Hellenize Jerusalem and Judaea and centuries later, Hadrian had not learned from the mistake. Just as Antiochos' attempts at Hellenization had sparked the Maccabean Revolt against Seleukid rule, Hadrian's refoundation of Jerusalem horrified the remaining Jewish inhabitants of Judaea and sparked the armed uprising known as the Bar Kokhba War (AD 132-135). Rebels under the leadership of the messianic figure, Simon bar Kokhba, fought a bloody guerilla war and inflicted severe losses on the Roman legions before they were finally crushed. Enraged by the revolt and its high cost in men and money, Hadrian took steps to eradicate Jewish nationalism by burning sacred texts, forbidding the use of Torah law or the Hebrew calendar, and changing the name of the province from Judaea to Syria Palaestina.

Although sometimes associated with a supposed imperial visit after the conflict, the happy reverse type and the use of the name Judaea on this travel issue strongly suggests production in AD 130 and the period before the outbreak of the Bar Kokhba War. The personification of Judaea offering a sacrifice over a pagan altar (an image that would have been offensive to many Jews of the period) underlines the kind of cultural insensitivity that incited the conflict in the first place. Although Hadrian was himself a great lover of Hellenism, he was very much blind to the fact that it was not something for everyone and that its imposition would not always result in the joyous reception depicted on the reverse of this coin.
 
Realized $8,700



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