Obolos 16

Sextus Pompey, 37-36 BC. Denarius (Silver, 18 mm, 3.64 g, 10 h), military mint in Sicily. MAG•PIVS•IMP[•ITER] Bare head of Pompeius Magnus to right; behind, jug; before, lituus. Rev. PRAEF / CLAS•ET•ORAE / [MAR IT•EX•S•] Neptune standing left, holding aplustre in his hand and with his right foot on a prow; to left and right, one of the Catanaean brothers bearing his parent on his shoulders. Babelon, (Pompeia) 27. Crawford 511/3a. CRI 334. Sydenham 1344. With a fine portrait and very attractively toned. Broken and expertly reattached, otherwise, nearly extremely fine.

The brothers Amphinomus and Anapius from Catania in Sicily are said to have carried their aging parents upon their shoulders during an eruption of Mt. Etna. The familial devotion in doing this at the sacrifice of all their worldly possessions delighted the gods, who caused the fires around them to be parted, thus allowing the family to escape unharmed. Familial piety was most sacred to the Romans, a people who worshipped their ancestors (the familial lares) and who considered themselves the descendants of Aeneas who likewise carried his family to safety from the devastation of Troy during its sack by the Greeks. Here Sextus Pompey's use of the type, in conjunction with the portrait of his deceased father on the obverse, plays to this highly regarded Roman virtue of strict pietas to one's family.