ANS Announced a January 9, 2026 Talk on the Expanding Impact of Alexander the Great's Coin Imagery
On January 6, 2026, the American Numismatic Society (ANS) announced Long Table 258, a talk scheduled for January 9, 2026, at 1:00 PM ET. According to the announcement, Joaneath Spicer, Curator Emerita at The Walters Art Museum, would explore how the profile of Alexander the Great wearing an animal scalp evolved across North Africa and reached the gardens of Versailles by the later 1600s.
Correction (Oct 13, 2026): We rewrote the headline, summary and body to match the source, an American Numismatic Society lecture announcement that gives only the talk's title, date, speaker and abstract. We removed unsupported statements on auction prices, investment performance, museum holdings, a link to the Indian campaign, reverse designs and imitation by Louis XIV's advisers; corrected a misspelling of the speaker's name; and made clear that this is an announcement of a January 2026 talk. The previous headline was "A Visual Language of Power: The Elephant Scalp Coin's Journey to Versailles."
On January 6, 2026, the American Numismatic Society (ANS) posted an announcement for Long Table 258, part of its lecture series. The talk was scheduled for January 9, 2026, at 1:00 PM ET. This article is based only on that announcement page; it is not a report on what was said at the talk.
Title and speaker
The talk is titled "Coins of Alexander the Great Wearing an Elephant Scalp: Their Expanding Impact from the Ancient Near East to Louis XIV's Versailles." The speaker is Joaneath Spicer, Curator Emerita at The Walters Art Museum.
What the announcement says
According to the announcement, in the visual arts of early modern Europe (1500 to 1700), ancient coins of the Greco-Roman past were important sources for adapting iconographic imagery within a different worldview. This applied especially to coins bearing imagery associated with major rulers such as Alexander the Great or the Emperor Augustus.
The coins represented undoubted authority. On the other hand, they were not accompanied by explanations, so they could become separated from their original context.
Spicer explores how the profile of Alexander wearing a lion's scalp, as adapted by his immediate successors, later evolved within various contexts across North Africa. The announcement's title refers to an elephant scalp, while its description refers to a lion's scalp; this article follows the announcement's wording in each case.
The announcement states that by the later 1600s, in the gardens of Versailles, Alexander had become a regal young Black woman personifying the continent of Africa.
Source: American Numismatic Society, "Long Table 258. Coins of Alexander the Great Wearing an Elephant Scalp: Their Expanding Impact from the Ancient Near East to Louis XIV's Versailles" (January 6, 2026).
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