...but not Constantinian. These two AE4's came together, like father and son. One is Magnus Maximus from Aquileia while the other is (his son) Flavius Victor from Arles (Constantia). Neither is perfect but both are better than average at least when it comes to the obverses. Neither is clear when it comes to the officina letter and that usually would keep me from buying a coin. These were cheap and attractive even though my ID's are a bit of a guess. I'm calling the Magnus SMAQP with the P likely but not the clearest it could be. The Victor is certainly CON but the leading letter strikes me as most likely an S. Both reverses read SPES ROMANORVM. These last of the campgate types are more crude and much smaller than the more common coins of sixty years earlier. Anyone who believes they see a different officina for either, please present your case. Magnus Maximus RIC55 page 105 Flavius Victor RIC29b page 69
Cool new campgates ... I only have examples from the Constantinian varieties. Magnus Maximus & Flavius Victor are a couple of pretty awesome Roman names, eh? (great additions)
Both are beautiful coins for LRBs and I like the last coin you posted, I would add them to my collection, missing mint marks and all. They also have great patinas.
I think part of it is most 'one coin per emperor' types would rather have the AE2 Magnus Maximus kneeling woman coin while they feel lucky to get even a small Victor. I paid the same for both of these coins and believe that proportion is correct due to the MM being slightly nicer. The seller had a decent MM AE2 but I got cheap and did not buy it since I have the exact coin. I'm not a dealer so I try not to buy coins that will need to be resold on purpose.
Does anyone have a theory as to why these later campgates were so crudely done? Some actually aren't too bad, but some of those Magnus Maximus or Arcadius campgates look so decrepit I half think they may in fact be depicting ruins. Most of the others just look like the reverse dies were engraved by children. Even Doug's Flavius Victor looks like the die cutter may have been smoking something that would have gotten him in trouble with the mint supervisor. For all that, I actually like these quirky little non-Constantinian campgates... some of them falling into the so bad they're good category, others just have a charm and character I think the more architecturally-sound earlier campgates lack. My Mag Max campgate here is one of my favourite coins. Z.
Very nice coin! I suspect the crew was working fast and graded on how many coins they made rather than how nice they were.
I wonder if the engraver was just a poor artist. It think it would be convievable that the engraver could have / should have made a nice coin, those could have been just as quickly eh? Although I really wonder if in the age of the fine Greek coins if the engraver was really a craftsman and by the Constantine era that same job belonged to a handful of sweat shop laborers, sort of like the shoe industry in the 21st century.
I suppose there are only so many tiers you can put on an AE4, but the wavy lines look like an intentional stylistic change to my eyes. It's just as easy to engrave a straight line as curved, no?
