Salonina
– Roman Empress: 253-268 A.D. – Wife of Gallienus
Silvered Bronze Antoninianus 21mm (4.25 grams) Rome mint: 267 A.D.
Reference: RIC 86, C 113
SALONINAAVG – Diademed, draped bust right on crescent.
VENVSAVG Exe: PXV – Venus standing left, holding helmet and spear with
shield.
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Venus was
a Roman goddess principally associated with love, beauty and fertility, who
played a key role in many Roman religious festivals and myths. From the
third century BC, the increasing Hellenization of Roman upper classes
identified her as the equivalent of the Greek goddess Aphrodite.
Her cult began in Ardea and Lavinium, Latium. On August 15, 293 BC, her
oldest known temple was dedicated, and August 18 became a festival called
the Vinalia Rustica. After Rome’s defeat at the Battle of Lake Trasimene in
the opening episodes of the Second Punic War, the Sibylline oracle
recommended the importation of the Sicillian Venus of Eryx; a temple to her
was dedicated on the Capitoline Hill in 217 BC: a second temple to her was
dedicated in 181 BC.
Venus seems to have played a part in household or private religion of some
Romans. Julius Caesar claimed her as an ancestor (Venus Genetrix); possibly
a long-standing family tradition, certainly one adopted as such by his heir
Augustus. Venus statuettes have been found in quite ordinary household
shrines (lararia). In fiction, Petronius places one among the Lares
of the freedman Trimalchio’s household shrine.
Julia Cornelia Salonina (d. 268, Mediolanum) was an Augusta, wife of Roman Emperor Gallienus and mother of Valerian II, Saloninus, and Marinianus.
Julia Cornelia Salonina’s origin is unknown. According to a modern theory, she was born of Greek origin in Bithynia, then part of the province of Bithynia et Pontus, Asia Minor. However, there exists some scepticism on that. She was married to Gallienus about ten years before his accession to the throne. When her husband became joint-emperor with his father Valerian in 253, Cornelia Salonina was named Augusta.
Cornelia was the mother of three princes, Valerian II, Saloninus and Marinianus. Her fate, after the murder of Gallienus, during the siege of Mediolanum in 268, is unknown. It is likely that either her life was spared or the she was executed together with other members of her family, at the orders of the Senate of Rome.
Her name is reported on coins with Latin legend as Cornelia Salonina; however, from the Greek coinage come the names Iulia Cornelia Salonina, Publia Licinia Cornelia Salonina, and Salonina Chrysogona (attribute that means “begotten of gold”).
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