Septimius Severus arrives in Rome

@wittwolf It isn't just fakes of this type but of these exact dies. These were struck from modern (transfer?) dies and thus the off-centre strike is not a useful tell that they are ancient. Here is an image of a batch of these fakes and your reverse die can be seen on the top left and is even more off-centre. Your obverse die can be seen again in this image (bottom centre). These were made "silvered" as below but also from a more copper based fabric as seen on your coin which is another "tell".

I have been keeping an eye on these since they emerged on the market.



Here is the same obverse die (Rome mint) mated with a reverse from Serdica, which is of course impossible



And here with a reverse of either Carus or Carinus from Antioch



And with a reverse of Aurelian?



and Probus? reverse from Antioch



Another Serdica combination - note the small flan


And like yours

 

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As usual, I am late to the party so all I have to offer are coins seen before. Note the same 'crab claw' hand salute in each.


Most of my coins are from 'Emesa' but the one below asked to be added here. Most of his friends show Septimius holding a staff and having the reverse spelling PBINCIPI. The R and the hand salute make this one 'special'.


Ordinary 'Emesa':

 

Interesting portrait of Septimius on the reverse of the last one.

 

So how do these two go together historically?

Septimius sets forth from the east (IMP VIIII)

and then arrives in Rome (IMP VIII)

or have I got things messed up in my head (which wouldn't be surprising)

 

I guess we are just seeing the fake industry getting better and better and now even undermining the "lower priced" coin market. I sadly also possibly got one of the Carus fakes seen on your picture. Here another adventus from me but this one should be real:
Emperor Probus - ADVENTVS AVG - Siscia mint

 

That is a real example from Siscia.

 

The adventus coin was minted when Severus came back from Gaul where he had crushed his opponent Albinus and was acclaimed Imperator for the 8th time in 196. After some time in Rome where he strengthened his regime and condemned senators who had sided with Albinus, he motivated his army probably by granting them some donativum (hence his 9th imperatorial acclamation) and left again for the East in 197, embarking in Brindisi and sailing directly to Syria (cf. Historia Augusta) to invade Mesopotamia. This departure is advertised by the profectio coin.

 

All correct in my opinion, except that Septimius' IMP VIIII in c. May 197 had nothing to do with a donative to the army, but was probably for Laetus' breaking of the Parthian siege of Nisibis, as I wrote in my Battle of Lugdunum thread on Forum.

 

Yes, of course the news of Laetus' victory was convenient and may have provided an official motive, but I am convinced that each imperatorial acclamation went with a donative - the most important from a soldier's point of view! Some of the men had left their camp in 193, walked to Rome, then to Asia, Antioch, Mesopotamia, then back to Gaul where they had fought a terrible battle, a real slaughter, then back to Italy, at last... But the vacation wasn't to last long: now they heard they were going back to Syria and Mesopotamia ! They deserved some bonus, don't you think so?

 

Imperatorial acclamations were for victories over enemies. Whether or not emperors regularly gave the army a donative on such occasions is a different question. What is your evidence that they did?

In any case I am quite certain that no emperor ever granted himself a new imperatorial acclamation without connection to any military victory, just because he needed an occasion to give the soldiers another donative!

 

Right. Here is a web page on PROFECTIO coins:

http://augustuscoins.com/ed/PROFECTIO/

 

Septimius Severus. 193-211 AD. AR Denarius (21x18mm; 3.25 gm; 6h). Struck 202 AD. Obv: Laureate head right. Rev: Septimius on horseback left, raising right hand and holding spear; before him, soldier holding vexillum and leading horse. RIC IV 248; BMCRE 304; RSC 1.

 

Interesting coins, among which is the sestertius of Caracalla stepping on an alligator symbolizing his plundering of the unarmed second city of the empire. Dio in his history discusses the reasons for Caracalla’s hatred for Alexandria, but Dio does not mention that this would have Caracalla’s second visit to Alexandria. The first would have been with his father Septimius Severus, after the defeat of P. Niger ca. 195(?).

On arriving at the city, Septimius noticed that Alexandria had not taken down the sign, “This is Niger’s City” and there may have been other indications of disloyalty. It could very well be that Caracalla’s hatred for Alexandria may be something that was imprinted on him at an early age. Just speculation but perhaps a basis for further research?

By the way the foregoing comes from Birleys wonderful book on Septimius- I cannot believe that I did not know of the existence of this book until relatively recently.

 

It was 198AD not 195 and the quote was “NIGER IS MASTER OF THIS CITY” - sorry for the error