PROCOPIUS Usurper 366AD shield CHI-RHO monogram Rare Ancient Roman Coin

£155.51 £116.63 Buy It Now or Best Offer, £9.42 Shipping, eBay Money Back Guarantee
Seller: cameleoncoins ✉️ (19,853) 98.5%, Location: Woodland Hills, California, US, Ships to: WORLDWIDE, Item: 303525502553 PROCOPIUS Usurper 366AD shield CHI-RHO monogram Rare Ancient Roman Coin. Procopius - Roman Usurper: 365-366 A.D. Procopius took part in the emperor Julian's campaign against the Persian Empire in 363. On his mother's side, Procopius was cousin of Emperor Julian. Both authors agree that the sign was not readily understandable as denoting Christ, which corresponds with the fact that there is no certain evidence of the use of the letters chi and rho as a Christian sign before Constantine.

One original Roman coin of:
Procopius - Roman Usurper: 365-366 A.D. Bronze AE3 17-19mm (2.01 grams) Constantinople mint: 366 A.D. Obv./ DN PROCO-PIVS PF AVG, pearl diademed, draped, cuirassed bust left . Rev./  / REPARATI-O FEL TEMP, emperor standing facing, looking right, holding labarum. palm branch upright in left field, chi-rho at top right. Mintmark CONSΔ. RIC IX Constantinople 17b var (unlisted officina).

  Rare and interesting as pictured.

Authenticity guaranteed.

 

Labarum of Constantine I, displaying the "Chi-Rho" symbol above.

The labarum   was a vexillum (military standard) that displayed  the "Chi-Rho"  symbol  ☧ , formed from the first two Greek letters of the word "Christ"   - Chi and Rho . It was first used by the Roman emperor Constantine I . Since the vexillum consisted of  a flag suspended from the crossbar of a cross, it was ideally suited to  symbolize the crucifixion of Christ .

Later usage has sometimes regarded the terms "labarum" and "Chi-Rho" as  synonyms. Ancient sources, however, draw an unambiguous distinction between the  two.

Etymology

Beyond its derivation from Latin labarum , the etymology of the word is  unclear. Some derive it from Latin /labāre/ 'to totter, to waver' (in the sense  of the "waving" of a flag in the breeze) or laureum [vexillum] ("laurel  standard").  According to the Real Academia Española , the related lábaro is also derived from Latin labărum   but offers no further derivation from within Latin, as does the Oxford English  Dictionary.[5]  An origin as a loan into Latin from a Celtic language or Basque has also been postulated. There is a  traditional Basque symbol called the lauburu ; though the name is only attested from  the 19th century onwards the motif occurs in engravings dating as early as the  2nd century AD.

Vision of Constantine A coin of Constantine (c.337) showing a depiction of his labarum  spearing a serpent.

On the evening of October 27, 312, with his army preparing for the Battle of the Milvian Bridge , the emperor Constantine I claimed to have had a vision  which led him to believe he was fighting under the protection of the Christian God .

Lactantius states that, in the night before the  battle, Constantine was commanded in a dream to "delineate the heavenly sign on  the shields of his soldiers". He obeyed and marked the shields with a sign  "denoting Christ". Lactantius describes that sign as a "staurogram", or a Latin cross with its upper end rounded in a  P-like fashion, rather than the better known Chi-Rho sign described by Eusebius of Caesarea . Thus, it had both the  form of a cross and the monogram of Christ's name from the formed letters "X"  and "P", the first letters of Christ's name in Greek.

From Eusebius, two accounts of a battle survive. The first, shorter one in  the Ecclesiastical History leaves no doubt that  God helped Constantine but doesn't mention any vision. In his later Life of  Constantine , Eusebius gives a detailed account of a vision and stresses that  he had heard the story from the emperor himself. According to this version,  Constantine with his army was marching somewhere (Eusebius doesn't specify the  actual location of the event, but it clearly isn't in the camp at Rome) when he  looked up to the sun and saw a cross of light above it, and with it the Greek  words Ἐν Τούτῳ Νίκα . The traditionally employed  Latin translation of the Greek is in hoc signo vinces - literally "In this  sign, you will conquer." However, a direct translation from the original Greek  text of Eusebius into English gives the phrase "By this, conquer!"

At first he was unsure of the meaning of the apparition, but the following  night he had a dream in which Christ explained to him that he should use the  sign against his enemies. Eusebius then continues to describe the labarum, the  military standard used by Constantine in his later wars against Licinius , showing the Chi-Rho sign.

Those two accounts can hardly be reconciled with each other, though they have  been merged in popular notion into Constantine seeing the Chi-Rho sign on the  evening before the battle. Both authors agree that the sign was not readily  understandable as denoting Christ, which corresponds with the fact that there is  no certain evidence of the use of the letters chi and rho as a Christian sign  before Constantine. Its first appearance is on a Constantinian silver coin from  c. 317, which proves that Constantine did use the sign at that time, though not  very prominently.  He made extensive use of the Chi-Rho and the labarum only later in the conflict  with Licinius.

The vision has been interpreted in a solar context (e.g. as a solar halo phenomenon), which would have been  reshaped to fit with the Christian beliefs of the later Constantine.

An alternate explanation of the intersecting celestial symbol has been  advanced by George Latura, which claims that Plato's visible god in Timaeus   is in fact the intersection of the Milky Way and the Zodiacal Light, a rare  apparition important to pagan beliefs that Christian bishops reinvented as a  Christian symbol.

Eusebius' description of the labarum

"A Description of the Standard of the Cross, which the Romans now call the  Labarum." "Now it was made in the following manner. A long spear, overlaid with  gold, formed the figure of the cross by means of a transverse bar laid over it.  On the top of the whole was fixed a wreath of gold and precious stones; and  within this, the symbol of the Saviour's name, two letters indicating the name  of Christ by means of its initial characters, the letter P being intersected by  X in its centre: and these letters the emperor was in the habit of wearing on  his helmet at a later period. From the cross-bar of the spear was suspended a  cloth, a royal piece, covered with a profuse embroidery of most brilliant  precious stones; and which, being also richly interlaced with gold, presented an  indescribable degree of beauty to the beholder. This banner was of a square  form, and the upright staff, whose lower section was of great length, of the  pious emperor and his children on its upper part, beneath the trophy of the  cross, and immediately above the embroidered banner."

"The emperor constantly made use of this sign of salvation as a safeguard  against every adverse and hostile power, and commanded that others similar to it  should be carried at the head of all his armies."

Iconographic career under Constantine Coin of Vetranio , a soldier is holding two  labara. Interestingly they differ from the labarum of Constantine in  having the Chi-Rho depicted on the cloth rather than above it, and  in having their staves decorated with phalerae as were earlier Roman  military unit standards. The emperor Honorius holding a variant of the  labarum - the Latin phrase on the cloth means "In the name of Christ  [rendered by the Greek letters XPI] be ever victorious."

Among a number of standards depicted on the Arch of Constantine , which was erected, largely  with fragments from older monuments, just three years after the battle, the  labarum does not appear. A grand opportunity for just the kind of political  propaganda that the Arch otherwise was expressly built to present was missed.  That is if Eusebius' oath-confirmed account of Constantine's sudden,  vision-induced, conversion can be trusted. Many historians have argued that in  the early years after the battle the emperor had not yet decided to give clear  public support to Christianity, whether from a lack of personal faith or because  of fear of religious friction. The arch's inscription does say that the Emperor  had saved the res publica INSTINCTV DIVINITATIS  MENTIS MAGNITVDINE ("by greatness of mind and by instinct [or impulse]  of divinity"). As with his predecessors, sun symbolism - interpreted as  representing Sol Invictus (the Unconquered Sun) or Helios , Apollo or Mithras - is inscribed on his coinage, but in  325 and thereafter the coinage ceases to be explicitly pagan, and Sol Invictus  disappears. In his Historia Ecclesiae Eusebius further reports  that, after his victorious entry into Rome, Constantine had a statue of himself  erected, "holding the sign of the Savior [the cross] in his right hand." There  are no other reports to confirm such a monument.

Whether Constantine was the first Christian emperor supporting a peaceful  transition to Christianity during his rule, or an undecided pagan believer until  middle age, strongly influenced in his political-religious decisions by his  Christian mother St. Helena , is still in dispute among  historians.

As for the labarum itself, there is little evidence for its use  before 317.In the course of Constantine's second war against Licinius in 324, the latter  developed a superstitious dread of Constantine's standard. During the  attack of  Constantine's troops at the Battle of Adrianople the guard of the labarum  standard were directed to move it to any part of the field where his soldiers  seemed to be faltering. The appearance of this talismanic object appeared to  embolden Constantine's troops and dismay those of Licinius.At the final battle of the war, the Battle of Chrysopolis , Licinius, though  prominently displaying the images of Rome's pagan pantheon on his own battle  line, forbade his troops from actively attacking the labarum, or even looking at  it directly.[16]

Constantine felt that both Licinius and Arius were agents of Satan, and associated them  with the serpent described in the Book of Revelation (12:9).  Constantine represented Licinius as a snake on his coins.

Eusebius stated that in addition to the singular labarum of Constantine,  other similar standards (labara) were issued to the Roman army. This is  confirmed by the two labara depicted being held by a soldier on a coin of Vetranio (illustrated) dating from 350.

Later usage Modern ecclesiastical labara (Southern Germany). The emperor Constantine Monomachos (centre  panel of a Byzantine enamelled crown) holding a miniature labarum

The Chi Rho is one of the earliest christograms used by Christians. It is formed by superimposing the  first two letters in the Greek spelling of the word Christ   ( Greek  : "Χριστός" ), chi=ch and rho=r, in such a way to produce  the monogram . The Chi-Rho symbol was also used by pagan Greek scribes to  mark, in the margin, a particularly valuable or relevant passage; the  combined  letters Chi and Rho standing for chrēston, meaning "good."

Although not technically a cross, the Chi Rho invokes the crucifixion  of Jesus as well as symbolizing his status as the Christ. There is early  evidence of the Chi Rho symbol on Christian Rings of the third century.

The labarum (Greek: λάβαρον) was a vexillum (military standard) that displayed the "Chi-Rho"  symbol, formed from the first two Greek letters of the word "Christ"  (Greek: ΧΡΙΣΤΟΣ, or Χριστός) - Chi (χ)  and Rho (ρ).  It was first used by the Roman emperor Constantine I . Since the vexillum consisted of a flag suspended from  the crossbar of a cross, it was ideally suited to symbolize crucifixion . The Chi-Rho symbol was also used by Greek scribes to  mark, in the margin, a particularly valuable or relevant passage; the  combined letters Chi and Rho standing for chrēston, meaning  "good."

Procopius (326 - May 27, 366), was a Roman usurper against Valentinian I,  and member of the Constantinian dynasty. According to Ammianus Marcellinus, Procopius was a native of Cilicia. On his  mother's side, Procopius was cousin of Emperor Julian. Procopius took part in the emperor Julian's campaign against the Persian Empire  in 363. He was entrusted with leading 30,000 men towards Armenia, joining King  Arsaces, and later return to Julian camp. At the time of Julian's death, there  were rumors that he had intended Procopius to be his successor, but when Jovian  was elected emperor by the Roman army, Procopius went into hiding to preserve  his life. The ancient historians differ on the exact details of Procopius' life  in hiding, but agree that he returned to public knowledge at Chalcedon before  the house of the senator Strategius suffering from starvation and ignorant of  current affairs. By that time, Jovian was dead, and Valentinian I shared the purple with his  brother Valens. Procopius immediately moved to declare himself emperor. He  bribed two legions that were resting at Constantinople to support his efforts,  and took control of the imperial city. Shortly after this he proclaimed himself  Emperor on September 28, 365, and quickly took control of the provinces of  Thrace, and later Bithynia. Valens was left with the task of dealing with this rebel, and over the next  months struggled with both cities and units that wavered in their allegiance.  Eventually their armies met at the Battle of Thyatira, and Procopius' forces  were defeated. He fled the battlefield, but was betrayed to Valens by two of his  remaining followers. Valens had all three executed May 27, 366.

Authenticity guaranteed.
Items will be shipped within 1 to 3 business days of purchase completion. 
FREE domestic SHIPPING INTERNATIONAL $7.99
(REGISTERED-$21.00) WE COMBINE SHIPPING. If you would like to have special shipping, please contact us. All items will be sent out in protected envelope and boxed if necessary. YOU ARE BIDDING ON AN ANCIENT ITEM(S) AS DESCRIBED AND PICTURED ABOVE!!! Every item offered by cameleoncoins is unconditionally guaranteed to be genuine & authentic. We can provide a certificate of authenticity or extended return policy by request only!!! Please include 5 dollars and a short request with your payment if you would like a COA!!! If in the unlikely event that an item is found to be reproduction, full return privileges are within 14 days of receiving the coins. We will promptly offer a full refund without hesitation or hassle.
  • Condition: Authenticity guaranteed!
  • Denomination: Follis
  • Historical Period: Roman: Imperial (27 BC-476 AD)
  • Year: 366 AD
  • Era: Ancient
  • Ruler: Procopius
  • Date: 366AD

PicClick Insights - PROCOPIUS Usurper 366AD shield CHI-RHO monogram Rare Ancient Roman Coin PicClick Exclusive

  •  Popularity - 4 sold, 1 available. 1 watcher, 0.0 new watchers per day, 1,453 days for sale on eBay. Normal amount watching.
  •  Best Price -
  •  Seller - 19,853+ items sold. 1.5% negative feedback. Great seller with very good positive feedback and over 50 ratings.

People Also Loved PicClick Exclusive