Italy. Duchy of Rome. Casting mold for lead tesserae (Metamorphic marly limestone known locally as "Palombino", 12.3 x 9.2 x 2.8 cm, 589 g), time of the Donation of Sutri, circa 8th - 10th centuries. Engravings depicting frontal busts of robed male figures. Cf. Muntoni, I, Popes Adrian I to Benedict VI. Rectangular slab with chipping along all sides and corners; front surface marked by scattered scratches and small chips. At the four corners are holes intended for securing the now-lost closing matrix; one of these still retains traces of lead used as a binding element. Reverse roughly hewn.

Casting mold for the production of lead tesserae, featuring two branched grooves for pouring metal, each aligned with five individual token cavities, for a total of ten obverse designs. Although the engravings are all distinct, they consistently depict a robed male bust in a frontal pose. The matrix, carved from Palombino limestone, was fashioned from a slab of Roman opus sectile. The smooth face bears the engraved outlines of the tokens. The frontal robed busts show close parallels with the portraits of popes found on the rare Papal issues known as Denari Antiquiores.

A lead tessera of similar type appeared in CNG 55, 13 September 2000, lot 1721 (Leo III to Leo VIII). This is particularly noteworthy, as it demonstrates that the same technique used to produce lead tokens in Roman times - namely, employing opus sectile slabs in palombino limestone as matrices - continued to be used for centuries. Cf. A. Forgeais, "Collection de Plombs Historiés trouvés dans la Seine. Cinquième série: numismatique populaire", Paris 1866, pp. 247-254 (with drawings of various matrices found in the Seine in Paris). G. Pardini et al., "Matrici per tessere plumbee dalle pendici nord-orientali del Palatino. Nota preliminare", in "Le regole del gioco. Tracce Archeologi Racconti. Studi in onore di Clementina Panella", ed. by A. F. Ferrandes and G. Pardini, Rome 2016, pp. 649-667 (for Roman-period specimens from the Palatine, Rome).