The hiker`s discovery has created a mystery: What was such a valuable coin doing around the Sea of Galilee?
California couple strikes gold after finding $10 million in rare coins
"It`s the only coin we know for the site in which it was found in Eastern Galilee. Eastern Galilee is a place where we don`t know very much about this time period," Ariel said.
The coin would have been too valuable for everyday use, like using a $100 bill to buy a pack of chewing gum. Common merchants in the Roman province probably would not have had change for such a high-value coin, Ariel said. It may have been part of a payment to a Roman soldier, Ariel hypothesized, perhaps stationed in the area to suppress the Bar Kochva revolt, a Jewish action against the Romans. The revolt had sympathizers near Galilee, said Ariel, and the soldiers may have been there to maintain order.
This rare coin is expected to fetch up to $5 million at auction
"You find one coin, you cannot very easily reconstruct what was going on. You don`t find gold coins on the ground, so you start fantasizing and thinking what could it be," Ariel said. Trajan`s bronze and silver coins are common in the region, but his gold coins are extremely rare, he said.
Only one such other gold coin has ever been found, according to the Israel Antiquities Authority. That coin, with an image of Emperor Augustus minted by Emperor Trajan, sits at the British Museum.
Now it has a twin.
Hiker finds rare gold coin in Israel
20 March 2016
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The coin shows the face of Emperor Augustus, Caesar`s heir and the founder of the Roman Empire. Augustus ruled from 27 BC to AD 14, during the time of Jesus. In AD 107, Emperor Trajan minted a series of coins to honor the Roman emperors who came before him, according to Donald Ariel, head curator of the coin department at the Israel Antiquities Authority. This gold coin was created as a tribute to the reign of Augustus. It refers to him as "Divus Augustus," or Augustus the Divine, who Ariel says was considered a deity after his death.
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