Un aigle contremarqué sur undupondiusde Titus appartenant à la Bibliothèque royale de Belgique, signe d’une provenance d’Este à Ferrare

Abstract

A rather large number of antique coins bear a countermark that depicts a small eagle on gold or silver. The author argues the thesis, already discussed for several centuries, that this eagle is not the emblem of the Gonzaga family of Mantua, but instead the ownership mark - affixed in the late sixteenth century - of the Este family, Dukes of Ferrara and later of Modena. Some of their coins were pawned as collateral for a loan from 1614 until 1646, and eventually they were sold over a period of many years - in the 1640s, in the 1650s, and finally in the 1790s. Many coins from this collection can be found in the museums of Florence, Milan, Modena and Paris, but additional examples have been dispersed worldwide. One such piece belongs to the Royal Library of Belgium, a rare dupondius of Titus in the guise of the divinized Augustus. A remarkable fact is that this type is copied from a coin of Tiberius, of which an example with the Este countermark is also known.