Nomos 21

Basil II Bulgaroktonos, with Constantine VIII, 976-1025. Histamenon nomisma (Gold, 21 mm, 4.35 g, 6 h), Constantinople, 989-1001. +IhS XIS REX REGNANTIhM Bust of Christ Pantocrator facing, wearing cross nimbus with double rim and with three pellets in the side arms and two in the upper, right hand raised in blessing, left holding book. Rev. +bASIL C CONStANTI bR On left, crowned bust of Basil II facing, wearing chlamys; on right, crowned bust of Constantine VIII, wearing ornamented robe; holding between them a long patriarchal cross crosslet with a large globule on the shaft above their hands. DOC 13 (catalogued as a Tetarteron) = Ratto 1943 = SB 1804 (Tetarteron). LHS 102, 2008, 480 (same dies, but holed). Nomos 14, 2017, 484 (same dies). Extremely rare, apparently only the fourth example of this type known. Some marks, otherwise, nearly extremely fine.

This coin type has long been rather an enigma. The only published example is the piece in the famous Ratto sale, which was there described simply as a ‘solidus’ that was not in Wroth's BMC volume. The DOC, however, considered the coin to be a Tetarteron (there was no weight given in Ratto and that coin seems to have disappeared so it could not be checked); this attribution was followed by the listing in Seaby. However, the present piece weighs 4.35 g and this shows that the type must have been intended to be a normal Histamenon. The curious costume worn by the two brothers (Basil II normally wears a loros and Constantine a rather simpler chlamys) may well indicate that the type was experimental in nature and was withdrawn from use after only a small number were struck (in fact, the three known pieces are all struck from the same die pair – pace the comment in LHS 102).