THE COIN COLLECTOR - World eBook Library

GREEK COINS
was wintering in the former city, b.c. 216-215, money
familiar to his troops was struck on the spot.
There is comparatively little Hellenic element or
interest in the numismatic systems of Numidia and
Mauretania, of which two regions we possess regal
and urban series belonging to the first century b.c,
and, in fact, of the former kingdom the fabric and
weight are rather Roman than Greek. Of Juba I.
of Numidia, Cicero speaks as a young man bene capil-
latiis, and another Roman writer relates how Caesar
on one occasion took him by the beard.
Of Mauretania the regal list is incomplete, and we
do not know whether Bogud III., who flourished about
b.c. 50-30, is the King Bocchus who engaged in medical
and philosophical pursuits, and confounded the learned
men of his court by drinking poison with impunity in
the name of the Trinity, and by the wonderful things
which he collected from the Book of Noah, according
to the terms of an early English work (said to be
translated from the French), printed at London about
1530.
To Iol in this country are ascribed the second brass
Roman coins, bearing a portrait of Julia, only child
of Augustus.
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