Legio XV Apollinaris. Circa 117-late 2nd century. Tessera (Bronze, 15 mm, 1.83 g, 2 h), uncertain mint in eastern Anatolia (Satala?). LEG / XV Raven standing to right. Rev. [AP] Boar standing to right. Classical Numismatic Group E-Auction 464 (2020), 540 corr. (legends, boar not dog). Classical Numismatic Group E-Auction 527 (2022), 342 corr. (legends, boar not dog) = Sol Numismatik 6 (2022), 187 corr. (boar not dog). Lydia Numismatics 10 (2021), 665 corr. (legends, boar not dog). Leu Web Auction 26 (2023), 4294. Numismfitz 2 (2023), 695 corr. (raven not eagle, boar not bull). Extremely rare. Fine.


The few surviving examples of this highly interesting issue have all been misinterpreted to some degree. Clearly it was manufactured under the auspices of Legio XV Apollinaris, a well attested legion whose history we can trace from its recruitment under Julius Caesar in 53 BC down to the early 5th century AD. There has been some debate as to what the signum, the coat of arms, of Legio XV Apollinaris was, with suggestions ranging from a griffin to Apollo himself, or one of his animal companions. Fortunately, the tesserae do resolve this question, as the legion's emblems clearly were the raven, Apollo's sacred bird, and a boar - animals that have been variously misinterpreted as eagles, dogs, or bulls in previous descriptions.

These interesting tesserae should likely be dated to after 117, when Hadrian stationed the fifteenth in Satala in Lesser Armenia, an important crossroad of the East-West route from Ankyra to Armenia and the North-South route linking Trapezous on the Black Sea coast with the legionary fortresses in Satala, Melitene, and Zeugma, and the great Syrian city of Antioch. Vexillae of Legio XV Apollinaris were also stationed in Trapezous and Ankyra, but it was in Satala that the legion's castrum stativum, its permanent headquarters, was constructed under the praefectus castrorum, Lucius Gavius Fronto in 117. It is also here that we last hear from the fifteenth, namely in the Notitia Dignitatum, a late Roman list of thousands of offices and army units, which records the Legio Quintadecima Apollinaris as still being stationed in Satala and Ankyra in the early 5th century, though not in Trapezous anymore, and being under the command of the Dux Armeniae.