Unpublished Medallion of Crispina

395, Lot: 284. Estimate $500. Sold for $1300. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

LYDIA, Silandus. Crispina. Augusta, AD 178-182. Æ Medallion (42mm, 49.59 g, 12h). Draped bust right / The Rape of Persephone: Hades driving quadriga right, head left, holding scepter and grasping the struggling Persephone. SNG Copenhagen –; SNG München –; SNG Tübingen –; SNG von Aulock –; BMC –; RPC Online –; unpublished in the standard references, but see SNG von Aulock 3176-8: three medallions of Crispina from Silandus that all share the same obverse die as this coin. Fine, stripped to bare metal but now retoninig, a few areas of orginal patina, some roughness. Extremely rare.

From the estate of Thomas Bentley Cederlind.

Hades fell in love with Persephone, the daughter of Demeter, and asked Zeus for permission to marry her. Fearing to offend his eldest brother by a downright refusal, but also knowing that Demeter would not forgive him if Persephone were committed to the underworld, Zeus diplomatically answered that he could neither give nor withhold his consent. This act emboldened Hades to abduct Persephone as she was picking flowers in a meadow and carry her away in his horse-drawn chariot to the underworld.