The Boy Emperor

The year AD 238 is often called the "Year of the Six Emperors". The year began with Maximinus Thrax as emperor, a career soldier of humble background who relied heavily on the army and showed little patience for the Senate. To fund his military campaigns, he imposed harsh tax demands across the provinces. The strain was especially severe in North Africa.

The Revolt

Herodian writes as a contemporary historian of the events that came next.

"For these reasons, and justifiably, the people were aroused to hatred and thoughts of revolt. Prayers were offered by all, and the outraged gods were invoked, but no one dared to start anything until, after Maximinus had completed three years as emperor, the people of Africa first took up arms and touched off a serious revolt for one of those trivial reasons which often prove fatal to a tyrant. The uprising occurred in this manner." (~early 238)
-Herodian (c. AD 170-240) History of the Roman Empire, 7.4

When local elites in Africa Proconsularis killed an imperial tax collector whose exactions had become intolerable, they took a further step: they urged the province’s elderly governor, Gordian I, and his son, Gordian II, to declare themselves emperors. The Senate in Rome, eager to rid itself of Maximinus, confirmed the Gordians as legitimate Augusti.

The Boy Caesar

The moment was short-lived for the Gordians. The Governor of Numidia, Capelianus, remained loyal to Maximinus and crushed the Gordian forces near Carthage within twenty-one days. Gordian II fell in battle, and his father committed suicide upon hearing the news. In the ensuing vacuum, the Senate appointed Pupienus and Balbinus as co-emperors to defend Italy against the approaching army of Maximinus. Yet, the Roman populace, still harboring a deep affection for the memory of the elder Gordians, rioted and demanded that a member of the Gordian family be included in the new government. This led to the elevation of the thirteen-year-old Marcus Antonius Gordianus - the grandson of Gordian I - to the rank of Caesar.

Rapid Succession

Maximinus was assassinated by his own troops at the Siege of Aquileia. Pupienus and Balbinus, who couldn't get along with each other, were murdered by the Praetorian Guard, and they hailed the young Gordian III as sole Augustus. At thirteen, Gordian III became the youngest sole Augustus in Roman history.

Timesitheus the praetorian prefect, father to Traquilliana, who was married to Gordian III in the summer of 241, brought administrative competence to the boy emperor's reign. The young Gordian was surprisingly beloved by the Roman populace. Historia Augusta, which is direct in calling out a conspiracy by Philip, describes him as "a light-hearted lad, handsome, winning, agreeable to everyone, merry in his life, eminent in letters; in nothing, indeed, save in his age was he unqualified for empire". (H.A. The Three Gordians 31.4)

EGYPT, Alexandria. Gordian III. AD 238-244. BI Tetradrachm (23.5mm, 12.10 g, 12h). Dated RY 5 (AD 241/2). Alexandria routinely dated issues by the emperor’s regnal year, marked with L + Greek numeral (here LΕ = year 5) - shortly after the marriage to Traquillina.

Obv: Laureate and cuirassed bust right, seen from the front, gorgoneion on breastplate

Rev: Homonoia standing facing, head left, raising right hand and holding double cornucopia; L Є (date) to left.

Ref: BM 1877; Köln 2657; Dattari (Savio) 4738; K&G 72.107; RPC VII.2 3800; Emmett 3411.5. Notes: Dark brown patina. Near EF ex CNG: Electronic Auction 577 Lot: 374, from the Dr. Thomas E. Beniak Collection, purchased from Empire Coins. Ex Seaby.

The gorgoneion on the breastplate is an "apotropaic" symbol - a form of protective magic intended to ward off evil and petrify enemies. The head of Medusa on his armor invokes the protection of Minerva (Athena) and signaling the emperor's power to petrify his Sasanian enemies.

"Furia Sabinia Tranquillina was married to the young Gordian III (q.v.) in 241. She was the daughter of the Praetorian Prefect and the marriage further cemented Gordian III's ties with the group that made him emperor. Her death-date is unknown."
-British Museum Notes, Tranquillina

Homonoia: Unity of Marriage and the Roman People

This coin issued in the Regnal Year 5 (AD 241/2) directly is shortly after the marriage of Gordian III and Tranquillina in May of 241. Homonoia stands, raising her right hand and holding a double cornucopia. Homonoia (Ὁμόνοια) is not merely "peace", she is the civic alignment that a city or empire needs when factions threaten to tear it apart.

The Roman-imperial Greek world treats Homonoia as a distinctly political virtue, a concept that could be used to announce (or demand) unity. The cornucopia is a broadly Greco-Roman sign of abundance, and the double cornucopia also echoes older Egyptian-Hellenistic royal iconography.

Ptolemaic Kings of Egypt, Arsinoe II Philadelphos. Died 270/268 BC. AR Dekadrachm (34mm, 35.63 g, 12h). Alexandreia mint. Struck under Ptolemy II, circa 261/0-253/2 BC. (not my coin) image courtesy of CNG Triton XXVI Lot 432 

In Ptolemaic and post-Ptolemaic visual language, double cornucopia, dikeras, is associated with Tyche as the goddess of abundance and serves to both highlight prosperity and legitimacy.

Given the time of issue, Homonoia, represents the union of Gordian & Tranquillina and the political stability brought by this marriage with prefect Timesitheus as the "Guardian of the State".

What kind of "tetradrachm" is this?

A modern collector reads "tetradrachm" and instinctively thinks "Greek silver". Roman Egypt complicates that instinct. RPC classifies the metal here as "debased silver" or "billon".

The province of Egypt occupied a unique status within the Roman imperial structure. From the victory of Augustus over Mark Antony and Cleopatra, Egypt was administered as the personal domain of the emperor, governed by a prefect of equestrian rank rather than a senatorial governor. This separation was maintained primarily to secure the grain supply of Rome, for which Egypt was the primary "breadbasket". To further insulate the province from external economic shocks and to centralize financial control, the Roman government maintained Egypt as a closed monetary system.

In this ecosystem, Alexandria produced billon tetradrachms - large coins of debased silver that were legally mandated to circulate within Egypt at a fixed exchange rate. By AD 241/2, the silver content of these coins had declined to a point where they were essentially fiduciary issues; their value was derived not from their intrinsic precious metal content, but from the state's authority to enforce their use. The tetradrachm corresponded to the denarius in exchanges and that equivalence is well attested at least for earlier imperial periods. The disparity in metal could allow the state to capture significant seigniorage from their production.

The Eastern War

A coin dated AD 241/2 sits on the edge of Gordian’s eastern war. Ancient and modern sources agree on the events of this war: preparations, campaigning, and a death remembered in competing narratives. Eutropius, writing later distills an imperial memory that reads like an epitaph for a reign that never matured:

"Gordianus admodum puer cum Tranquillinam Romae duxisset uxorem, Ianum Geminum aperuit et ad Orientem profectus Parthis bellum intulit, qui iam moliebantur erumpere."

"Gordian, while still a boy, having married Tranquillina at Rome, opened [the gates of] Janus Geminus and, having set out for the East, brought war upon the Parthians, who were already attempting to break out."
-Eutropius (c. AD 320-390), A Summary of Roman History, 9.2

Opening the gates of the Temple of Janus in Rome was the state’s most formal way of declaring a "just war".

Timesitheus - Gordian’s father-in-law and praetorian prefect - was the adult mind of the regime. He ran the administration and the war while the teenage emperor supplied legitimacy. When Timesitheus died in 243, that balance collapsed. Gordian lost his strongest protector and his most competent manager at the exact moment the army and the campaign demanded both. His replacement as prefect, Philip, now controlled access to the emperor and the army’s pay and supplies. Within months Gordian was dead under disputed circumstances, and Philip emerged as the only figure positioned to take command and impose a settlement.

Rome framed the eastern campaign as success, but the end was ambiguous and politically charged. Shapur I, the Sasanian king, in his monumental trilingual inscription (ŠKZ), presents Gordian as defeated and dead during the retreat.  Šāpur’s Naqš-e Rostam inscription elsewhere makes a stronger claim: it portrays Gordian as killed in battle at Misiche and then narrates Philip’s settlement negotiations.

Image from the EBay sale Feb 14, 2026

Roman tradition claims Gordian’s body was returned and he was deified.

The Beniak Collection

There is a little known about the recent history of this ancient coin, from oldest to most recent:

• Seaby

• Empire Coins (Late 1980s): an influential firm founded by Dennis Kroh. Multiple coins in the Beniak collection carry "Empire" pedigrees. There is some evidence in auction listings that Beniak made a significant purchase from Empire coins in April 1988. Empire Coins was operated by Victor England at this time, who used this auction as a major platform just before joining other partners to form the Classical Numismatic Group (CNG) in 1990.

• Dr. Thomas E. Beniak Collection

• EBay seller: james-miniature-painting-shoppe, in Winthrop, Maine

Seaby Ltd was a major London numismatic firm and publisher, whose numismatic business was acquired by CNG in 1990–1991.

Sirius is the brightest star in the constellation Canis Major

Dr. Thomas E. Beniak, is highlighted CNG’s Triton XXIX catalog describing the Dr. Thomas E. Beniak Collection of Roman Egyptian coins as a world-class corpus, emphasizing a remarkable run of large bronze drachms spanning Nero to Claudius II Gothicus. Dr. Beniak was a clinical psychologist and neuropsychologist who practiced in Minnesota and was affiliated with the University of Minnesota Medical School. His collection is best known for his run of large bronze drachms related to the Great Sothic Cycle - an Egyptian cosmological event marking the realignment of the heavens and the flooding of the Nile. For ancient Egyptians, the heliacal rising of Sirius (Sopdet or Sothis) was not an abstract calendar event but a sacred celestial sign that announced the flooding of the Nile and the rebirth of the land each year.

References

• Sheppard, A.R.R. "'Homonoia' in the Greek Cisties of the Roman Empire" Ancient Society 15/17 (1984): 229–52.

• Mairat, Jérôme, and Marguerite Spoerri Butcher. "Roman Provincial Coinage, Volume VII.2: From Gordian I to Gordian III (AD 238–244). All Provinces except Asia". London: British Museum Press; Paris: Bibliothèque nationale de France, 2022.

• Fulińska, Agnieszka. "Iconography of the Ptolemaic Queens on Coins: Greek Style, Egyptian Ideas?" Studies in Ancient Art and Civilization 14 (2010): 73–92.

• Meckler, Michael L. "Gordian III (238–244 A.D.)". De Imperatoribus Romanis: An Online Encyclopedia of Roman Emperors.

• Bruno Overlaet, "ŠĀPUR I: Rock Reliefs", Encyclopaedia Iranica, published November 3, 2017, last modified November 6, 2017.

• CoinsWeekly. 2015. "40 Years in Business - The History of Classical Numismatic Group." September 17, 2015.

• Homren, Wayne, ed. 2025. “CNG: Triton XXIX Auction.” The E-Sylum: Numismatic Bibliomania Society Newsletter 28 (no. 50): Article 18.

• Shapur I. "The Inscription of Shapur I at Naqsh-e Rustam in Fars". Translated by M. Sprengling, A. Maricq, and others. Sasanika Sources. Entered by Warren Soward.