Vespasian, 69-79. Sestertius (Orichalcum, 35 mm, 25.74 g, 5 h), Rome, 71. IM[P C]AES VESPASIAN AVG P M TR P P P COS III Laureate head of Vespasian to right. Rev. VICTORIA AVGVSTI / S C Victory, naked to waist, standing right, left foot set on helmet, inscribing [OB/ CIV / SER?] in three lines on shield attached to palm tree; to right, Judaea, draped and veiled, seated right on cuirass in attitude of mourning, resting her head on her left hand. BMC 582-3. Bromberg ii 612. CBN 560-1. Cohen 625. Hendin 6537. RIC 221. Samel 2301. Shoshana I 20525. Flan fault on the edge of the obverse and the reverse double struck, otherwise, very fine.



For this reverse, see the note to lot 352 above. Here Vespasian adopts the iconography of his civil-war rival Vitellius and recasts it within the new Flavian imagery of victory over the Jews, adding the mourning figure of Judaea to the type.