Coin Portraying Emperor Maxentius (306-312): Artwork and History

Coin Portraying Emperor Maxentius (306-312) is in the Art Institute of Chicago collection. The museum lists its creator attribution as Roman.

The work and its context

The Art Institute of Chicago describes the work:

The front (obverse) of this coin portrays the emperor Maxentius facing right and wearing a crown of laurels. On the back (reverse), the twins Castor and Pollux are shown standing, each holding scepter and with a horse behind them. One of the earliest and most popular themes on Roman coinage was the Dioscuri, or Castor and Pollux, hero twins who are usually shown with two stars placed above their heads to denote their celestial influence. They give form to a dual myth, representing youth and courage. Castor and Pollux were the sons of the god Jupiter and a mortal woman named Leda, and the story of their birth from an egg explains the peculiar cap which they always wear, evidently representin half of an egg shell.

Object facts

• Title: Coin Portraying Emperor Maxentius
• Date: 306-312
• Artist attribution: Roman
• Place of origin: Roman Empire
• Medium: Bronze
• Dimensions: Diam.: 2.2 cm (7/8 in.)
• Type: Coin
• Department: Arts of Greece, Rome, and Byzantium
• Reference number: 1923.1363

Collection credit

Gift of Mrs. William Nelson Pelouze

View the original

Explore the artwork in the Art Institute's collection, including its image and the museum's current catalogue details.

The description above is credited to the Art Institute of Chicago and reused under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0; HTML formatting has been converted to plain text. Other catalogue metadata and the public-domain image are provided under CC0 1.0.