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Here's a gold stater to make
your mouth water and your bank
manager wet himself: a dazzling
Cunobelinus Biga which we
unhesitatingly grade as
'Extremely Fine'. One which
clearly shows not only the full
CAMVL, but also the little
'heart face'. Rainer Kretz says:
“This handsome example of a biga
stater belongs to the early part
of the series, having been
struck from the first obverse
and the second reverse die (my
dies A2). A design inherited
(with some modifications) from
Tasciovanos’ RICON stater, the obverse shows a
conventional and neatly executed
legend, which on later dies
progressively deteriorates
before eventually turning into a
monogram of sorts. The obverse
proudly proclaims his capital
and mint Camulodunon,
while the completed reverse
legend gives his name in the
genitive i.e. CVNOBELINI - thus
indicating ‘(an issue) of
Cunobelinus. The reverse is
unusual for being the only
British gold issue to feature a
two-horse chariot, thus tracing
its origins back by a full three
centuries to the staters of
Philip II of Macedon (333-300
BC), from which all our British
stater issues are ultimately
descended. As to whether the
reverse of the biga stater
itself - perhaps via some
intermediary Gaulish type -
harks back to those earliest
proto-types is debatable and
must for now remain uncertain.
Whatever the origins of this
design may ultimately be, it is
undoubtedly a manifestation of
the early Britons obsession with
the horse-drawn chariot and as
such no different to our own
love affair with the motorcar.
Once again, the depiction of the
horses changes quite
significantly over the lifetime
of this series from the rather
stiff, stylised horses shown on
this coin to the bolder and more
naturalistic horses of the later
issues.” Chris Rudd May list.
6.4.10 |
