Severina wife of Aurelian 274AD Rare Ancient Roman Coin “Lucky Venus” i52825

Item: i52825

Authentic Ancient

Coin of:

Severina – Roman Empress: 274-275 A.D. – wife of Emperor
Aurelian
Bronze Denarius 19mm (2.34 gram.) Rome, 274 A.D., Scarce.
Reference: RIC 6, Göbl 141, C 14
SEVERINA AVG – Diademed, draped bust right.
VENVS FELIX Exe. O – Venus standing left,
holding apple and scepter.

You are bidding on the exact item pictured,

Authenticity.

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.

Venus Felix (“Lucky Venus”), her cult tile at her temple on the
Esquiline Hill
and at
Hadrian
‘s
Venus Felix et Roma Aeterna
on the
Via Sacra
. This epithet is also used for
a specific sculpture at the Vatican Museums
.

Ulpia Severina was the only

Empress

ruling the Roman Empire in her own right. She was the wife of Roman

emperor Aurelian

, by whom she had a daughter. Very little is known about her, as

there are no literary sources mentioning her existence. Almost everything known

about her, including her name, is gathered from coins and inscriptions.

Aurelian married Severina before becoming emperor. According

to coinage depicting her, Severina gained the title

in the autumn of

274 A.D. She also

received the titles of Pia (“pious”)

and mater castrorum et senatus et patriae

(“mother of the barracks (armies), senate, and country”).

It is presumed that she was a daughter of Ulpius Crinitus,

although this is based on the unreliable

and thus, is purely speculative.

Some scholars believe that she was from

Dacia
, where the

Ulpius
was

common due to the influence of

Trajan
.

According to

, Aurelian regularly presented Ulpia

sigillaria

by the end of

Saturnalia
,

according to tradition.

There is considerable numismatic evidence for Severina ruling

in her own right between the death of Aurelian and the election of

Marcus Claudius Tacitus

.