Ancient Fantasy Coin from the RBW Collection

This Italian "medalet", 20mm, 11h, 3.7g, by an unknown artist is from the 18th to early 19th century, apparently issued for the Grand Tour trade. Although it reads "P. LEPIDVS" on the obverse, the portrait looks a lot like Mark Antony. The initial image of this post is from Babelon illustrating a denarius of Antony in 31 BC. The reverse draws from one of my favorite Roman republican denarii of L. Aemilius Paullus from 63-62 BC.

This Italian "medalet", 20mm, 11h, 3.7g, by an unknown artist is from the 18th to early 19th century, apparently issued for the Grand Tour trade. Although it reads "P. LEPIDVS" on the obverse, the portrait looks a lot like Mark Antony.  The reverse draws from one of my favorite Roman republican denarii of L. Aemilius Paullus from 63-62 BC.

In "The Voyage of Italy", Richard Lassels, 1686, the author provides an early references to the "Grand Tour":

"Traveling brings a Man a world of particular profits. It contents the Mind with the rare discourses we hear from learned Men, as the Queen of Saba was ravished at the Wisdom of Solomon. It makes a Wiseman much the wiser by making him see the good and the bad in others. [skip] In fine, it's an excellent Commentary upon Histories; and no Man understands Livy and Ceſar, Guicciardin and Monluc like him, who hath made exactly the Grand Tour of France, and the Giro of Italy."
-Richard Lassels, 1686

L. Aemilius Lepidus Paullus, 62 BC, AR Denarius, Rome mint

Obv: Veiled and diademed head of Concordia right

Rev: Trophy; to left, three captives (King Perseus of Macedon and his two sons) standing right; to right, Paullus standing left

Ref: Crawford 415/1; Sydenham 926; Aemilia 10

The Provenance of this medalet was also appealing: ex CNG 428 Lot 665 ex Rick B. Witschonke "RBW" collection. The collector was Rick Witschonke (1945–2015), whose collection of 1,860 coins was auctioned off in three sales:

- Triton III Sale, December 1999 the majority of the RBW Republican gold coins were offered in lots 808 to 851

- Numismatica Ars Classica Sale 61, October 2011

- Numismatica Ars Classica Sale 63, May 2012

In the introduction to the NAC 61 sale, RBW describes his first experience with Roman republican coins:

"At the tender age of ten, I first discovered an interest in collecting coins (I am convinced that the propensity to collect is a genetically inherited condition). After a few years of dabbling with Whitman “penny boards”, US type coins, and foreign crowns, I bought my first Roman Republican denarius in a Lu Riggs auction in 1960, and was amazed that a coin of such antiquity, beauty, and historical interest could be purchased for such a modest price."​

The full RBW collection was published in 2013 - see:

R. Russo, The RBW Collection of Roman Republican Coins, with the collaboration of A. De Falco; with historical notes by D. Vagi; edited by A. McCabe, A. Russo, G. Russo and C. Hallgarth. Zürich and London: Numismatica Ars Classica, 2013. Pp. xxvii+407, illus. ISBN 9788877948359