Septimius September!

First one for me!
And the irony is that I live in the Black Sea region.

 

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12. For no particular reason my offering for the twelfth is another Emesa denarius but not one you will find it easy to duplicate. Left facing heads for Septimius exist with several reverses but none are common. This one is the only of its reverse I have seen and the reverse is unusual even with a right facing portrait. Fortuna Reduci reverses come in several variations - seated, standing, as Hilaritas with long palm and, as here, as Pax sacrificing over an altar. Most coins will abbreviate the reverse legend but this one spells out completely FORTVNA REDVCI. That makes it a less common guise of Fortuna with a less common legend but the truth is that any left facing Septimius is a coin worthy of my collection. This coin may (?) be an obverse die link to BMC 328 and was similar to a Bickford-Smith coin (his 152) I assume is now in the British Museum. I got it in 1991 and am happy to celebrate our thirtieth anniversary.

 

Septemberius 12 -

Another denarius featuring Victory. I am not entirely sure I got the attribution right, as some of the legend is missing (corrections very much welcome):


Septimius Severus Denarius
(194 A.D.)
Rome Mint
L SEPT SEV PERT AVG [IMP III] laureate head right / [VICT] AVG TR P II COS II
PP, Victory advancing right, holding wreath and palm.
RIC 38A
(2.87 grams / 17 mm)
(ex-Postal Commemorative Soc.)
eBay July 2014

This one came in a fancy Postal Commemorative Society "deluxe Collector's folio" along with a drachm from Illyria. It was a $22.50 eBay buy, which is a lot cheaper than it cost originally ($147 "payable in five monthly installments").

 

As a poor echo to the superb coin illustrated by @dougsmit above. I only have one left facer and it falles short of his in many many regards. It is a limes or a fouree core and it imitates a later Laodicea issue. It is likely to be the only lefty I will ever own.

Obv:– L SEPT SEV AVG IMP XI PART MAX, laureate head left
Rev:– IVST-ITIA, Justitia (Justice) seated left with patera & scepter
Minted in style of Laodicea-ad-Mare. A.D. 199-202
Reference:– Copies RIC 505. Copies RSC 251

 

I once thought that but found a second (die match). I'm sure there is a story behind these that I would like to know. Are they modern? Was there a hoard? Is there a solid silver one? My ignorance is vast.


These also come in right facing:

 

SEPTIMIUS SEVERUS
AR Denarius
OBVERSE: SEVERVS PIVS AVG, laureate head right
REVERSE: PART MAX P M TR P VIIII, two captives seated at foot of trophy
Struck at Rome, 201 AD
2.86g, 19mm
RIC 176

 

There was a spate of these lefty Justitias about a dozen years ago. I cannot answer your questions but I haven't seen any more of these for quite a while but I will hang onto mine hoping it is ancient as my lone lefty.

 

One of my favorite 7Sev coins is this rather nice bronze limes denarius.


I tend to prefer fully bronze limes rather than pockmarked fourrees, such as the below:

 

I hope they are ancient, too, but I can't say I am all that certain. My two are moldmates unless my better one was the mother. A dozen years ago? I got my better one from NFA XXXIII lot 1604 (illustrated in the plates and still have the catalog and invoice). The description mentioned "breaks in plating on the reverse" but they were on the obverse. This sale was May 1994, the same month Bruce McNall sold his interests in the L.A. Kings hockey team and a few months after he was sent to prison. I don't know who was responsible for not knowing obverse from reverse. They had bigger troubles then. My paperwork also included a letter signed 'Robert Allen' requesting rapid payment, preferably by wire transfer. I wonder if this would count as saleable provenance as one of the last coins sold by NFA? NFA was "Fun While it Lasted!"
That lefty was the only coin I got from NFA sales that I considered less than advertised. They had interesting coins and nice catalogs. Memo to self: Don't bid in sales by convicted felons. I won one other from XXXIII, a decent, mid grade Commodus.

 

Following on from "All Eastern Severans are strange; some are just stranger than others.". The portrait on this one seems odd. It is almost as if the engraver started on the beard but forgot to insert a jaw and the beard almost seems to start at where the lips would be or at least the jaw is quite small.

Obv:– IMP CAE L SEP SEV PERT AVG COS II, Laureate head right
Rev:– VICT AVG, Victory walking left, holding wreath in right hand, palm in left
Minted in Emesa, A.D. 194 - 195
References:– BMCRE 395, RIC 424, RSC 675a

 

13. When I first started collecting Septimius, listings sometimes included coins of Laodicea dated IMP VI. Later it was found that all listings above IMP II and below IMP VIII were misreadings based on the loss of one or more I which had been placed beyond the point of the bust and not well struck. For example, this coin clearly reads IMP VI.


BUT the coin below shares the obverse die and shows the two I's separated from IMP VI by the point of the bust. There are also IMP VII-I coins where only one I fell beyond the point.

There are also coins with IMP II with one or both I's lost in this manner. My best example of this has the II closer to the LSEPT than to IMP. Last I heard, there are still no confirmed readings of Laodicea below IMP VIII except for IMP II. Care must be taken when reading low grade or poorly struck coins.


Please forgive me for showing two backup coins to reinforce the point made by the first coin which is the official #13 in my series for this special month. Sometimes we need to remember that most coins are better understood when taken as a part of the larger group from which they come. That is where museum curators, big dealers and TPG graders have an advantage over the rest of us. There is no education in coins better than handling in person a few hundred thousand actual coins. There is much to be learned from books and photos but these are no substitute for metal to eye contact. That is why I miss coin shows so much.

 

Indeed! The fact that these coins are obverse die matches allows one to reconstruct the missing part of the obverse legend on the first by reading the second, even though they are of different reverse types.


Septimius Severus, AD 193-211.
Roman Provincial Æ assarion, 17.2 mm, 3.08 g, 1 h.
Moesia Inferior, Marcianopolis.
Obv: ΑV Κ Λ CΕ|CΕVΗΡΟ, laureate and draped bust right.
Rev: ΜΑΡΚΙΑΝΟ|ΠΟΛΙΤΩΝ, Homonoia wearing kalathos, standing left, holding patera and cornucopiae.
Refs: BMC 7; AMNG 590; Varbanov 734.


Septimius Severus, AD 193-211.
Roman Provincial Æ assarion, 16.4 mm, 2.34 g, 1 h.
Moesia Inferior, Marcianopolis.
Obv: ΑV Κ Λ CΕ|CΕVΗΡΟ, laureate and draped bust right.
Rev: ΜΑΡΚΙΑΝΟ|ΠΟΛΙΤΩΝ, eagle standing facing, head right.
Refs: Moushmov 391a var. (obv. legend); AMNG 593.

 

Following on from @dougsmit 's excellent, educational post. These reading issues impact on the IMP II and IMP VIII series leading to mis-attributions of

IMP & IMP I for IMP II
Doug has illustrated the IMP for IMP II I will add an example that could easily be placed as IMP I

IMP VI & IMP VII for IMP VIII
Here an off-centre strike make the obverse die even more difficult to read without the die matches above

An even more off-centre strike makes the reading impossible

without a die match, which unfortunately doesn't clearly show all 3 Is

Often the tight nature of the flan means one edge of the legend is missing. These appear to read IMP VII with the I we are interest in being supposed beneath the neck


The BM example of this obverse both have fuller flans but neither is clear to me though undoubtedly all are IMP VIII




Am I alone in coming to the conclusion that the same engraver is most likely to have produced both these obverse dies. The engraving style of the bust is so close......

 

Septemberius 13: a denarius, possibly plated:


Septimius Severus - Denarius
(196 A.D.)
Rome Mint
L SEPT SEV PERT AVG IMP VIII, laureate head right / FORTVNAE REDVCI, Fortuna seated left holding rudder & cornucopia.
RIC 78a, RSC 188, BMC 161
(3.12 grams / 18 mm)
eBay Aug. 2017

 

SEPTIMIUS SEVERUS
AR Denarius
OBVERSE: SEVERVS PIVS AVG, laureate head right
REVERSE: P M TR P XVI COS III P P, Concordia seated left on throne, holding patera and sceptre
Struck at Rome, 208 AD
3.42g, 20mm
RIC 218

 

I see no reason to believe it is plated. This coin dates to a period when the Rome mint was doing worse work than some of the counterfeiters. The improvement that occurred shortly later makes me wonder how many people lost their jobs and/or heads about the same time.

 

Thanks for the observation, Doug. I appreciate the second set of eyes on that.

The only reason I suggested it was the weird little crack thing curling around the bust; it looks a little dark inside there and I feared a possible base core.

 

Today this thread dropped from page one suggesting interest is waning so I wonder if it will last through the month. Perhaps I should change to a few coins that are not Eastern once in a while.

14. Septimius Severus is referred to as 'The African Emperor' since he was born in Leptis Magna (now in Libya) from Roman (or Romanized?) parents. We have already seen postings of some of his coins honoring Africa and his extensive building projects there. This denarius is from the later years of his reign and is not as frequently seen as the popular Africa standing and the very popular Dea Caelestas riding a lion types. Here we see the personification of Africa reclining, wearing an elephant headdress with a snake (thanks to PeteB for the correction) and holding a scorpion. Before her is a basket of grain. She holds a cornucopia reminding the viewer of the importance of Africa in the Roman grain supply. The obverse is the common late period SEVERVS PIVS AVG with three forked beard which most people associate with Septimius. The type is traditionally assigned to 207 AD but I do not know on what basis since, unlike the Africa standing coins, there are no dated coins with the seated figure. The portrait does place it in that later period probably just before the Emperor left for his final campaigns in Britain. My example came from a collection being disbursed by Andy Singer.

 

At the tail end of the production on the eastern mints the coins started to align much more with the output of Rome. The later coins adopted the SEVERVS PIVS AVG for a smallish issue. The style is distinctly oriental.

Obv:– SEVERVS PIVS AVG, Laureate head right
Rev:– COS III P P, Victory advancing left, holding wreath and palm
Minted in Laodicea-ad-Mare, A.D. 202
Ref:– RIC 526

 

For today, here is one of my favorite Jupiter reverses. Its depiction of this deity probably copies the statue of Jupiter at the Roman Capitol (see Lichtenberger: Severus Pius Augustus, Leiden: Brill 2011, 178–181):

Septimius Severus, Roman Empire, AR denarius, 197–198 AD, Rome mint. Obv: L SEPT SEV AVG IMP XI PART MAX, head of Septimius Severus, laureate, r. Rev: IOVI CONSERVATORI; Jupiter seated left, holding Victory and sceptre. 17.5mm, 3.30g. Ref: RIC IV.1 Septimius Severus 130. Ex FSR 111, lot 257.