Limes Denarius

Do you Septimius Severus specialists also collect those AE "limes" denarii? There sure are a lot of them out there.

 

Log in or Sign up to hide this ad.

I have very few. So many have little appeal because of their low grade and it seems too many people are willing to pay more for one than I am. I do have some wildly odd coins but few are really Limes. The one below is Clodius Albinus legend, Septimius Severus features and Commodus reverse. That was odd enough for me to want it.

 

I don't collect Septimius Severus, but I have a bronze denarius:

Septimius Severus. AD 193-211.
Æ Denarius (15mm, 2.48 g, 1 h)
Eastern? Copying a Rome mint issue of AD 201-202.
Laureate head right
Septimius, veiled, standing left, holding branch and scroll
Cf. RIC IV 265​

 

Why do you suspect Eastern? The type it copies came after the closing of the Eastern mints. I suppose it could be made by employees of the mint after the diecutters left town but there is nothing remotely similar to any Eastern coin. For that matter the fanciful suggestion that it was made after the cutters left is ridiculous since the last Eastern mint coins were regularly very round and well made. This looks more Western to me and by someone who did not have any familiarity with either Greek or Latin. Does it have certain signs of being ancient?

 

I see nothing to suggest it is not ancient. Honestly, the suggestion of eastern is entirely 'ex rectum.' At the time I was cataloging the piece,it didn't seem western. It certainly doesn't look much like the bronze denarii from eastern Europe.

 

Hi all I'm resurrecting this old thread because I don't think this rough little thing deserves it's own and I want to follow up on some of the previous discussion on Septimius Severus bronze denarii.

The coin below is imitating either RIC 125a (Rome) or RIC 503a (Laodicea ad Mare). Both coins have the same legends front and back so the difference is based on style. I was particularly hoping @dougsmit or @maridvnvm may be able to take a look as I've seen each discuss eastern style SS denarii.

Is the style:
1.) Rome
2.) Eastern (Laodicea)
3.) An imitation that could go either way
4.) Or a coin that is too rough to tell.


Septimius Severus AE Denarius. L SEPT SEV AVG IMP XI PART MAX, laureate head right / COS II P P, Victory walking left, holding wreath and palm.

 

Reference.
cf RIC 80

Obv. IMP CAESAR TRAIAN HADRIANVS AVG.
Laureate head right.

Rev. P M TR P COS III.
Aequitas sttanding left, holding scales and cornucoopiae.

1.63 gr
18 mm

 

Got this Limes from @John Anthony ... I thought it was very cool, and the whole concept of LIMES is interesting to me. Fouree Core? Substitute currency in conflict areas so they do not risk precious metal currency? History is cool...


RI Hadrian, AD 117-138 Æ Limes Denarius 18mm 3.5mm after AD 125 Genius stndg sacrificing altar cornucopia RIC II 173

 

@Orange Julius . Your coin copies the eastern style of Laodicea-ad-Mare.

I have a couple of "Limes" that also copy this mint. Bought because they are gap fillers for the real versions that I currently don't have.

A left bust IVSTITIA


VOTIS / DECEN / NALI / BVS

 

i have two, one of Sept. Severus & Julia Domna. they are interesting coins. Julia Domna Lymes Denarius

 

Here is a a coin I bought in 1998. Back then denarii of this base metal were not called "limes-denarii" but now coins like this one are.


Diadumenian (217-218)
19-17 mm. 6:00. 2.75 grams
Patinated black. Official style. Could this be a cast? Or could it be official and the silver has just tarnished to black?
It is light weight, but so is the genuine BMC specimen.
M OPEL ANT DIADUMENIAN CAES
/SPES PVBLICA, Spes advancing left, holding flower.
Sear 2072. BMC (Macrinus) 94, plate 81.3 (2.62 grams!). RIC 116.

 

I was looking through the coins for sale at http://augustuscoins.com and noticed a familiar face.

Here is the coin for sale:

and here is mine:

If it weren't for a difference in the wreath Victory is holding... I'd say they were of the same dies or cast. Same type and legends, same soft reverse, same (although different location) chunk out of one side... Actually, I do think they are the same obverse and reverse and the extra on the wreath is an accretion or something.

Anyway, I'm not sure if I have a point to make, I just thought it was interesting to find two very similar unofficial SS limes denari of the same dies or cast mold.

 

I agree. I have seen few duplicates of limes coin but the Laodicea style AE denarii do seem to come in groups.

 

After reading Valentinian's excellent Imitations page linked earlier in this thread, I think these junky coins from a Balkan-heavy seller's bin should be categorized as:

Fourrées (silver plating remaining)

Julia Mamaea, mimicking RIC 351 Geta, mimicking RIC 346 (Geta needs a bronze disease soak, so thanks for making me look at him)


Limesfalsa (Denarii types made in AE)

Severus Alexander Caracalla Julia Domna
mimicking RIC 144 mimicking RIC 208a and 108 mimicking RIC 554


I bought them just because they looked strange, and appreciate that this thread provided info for categorizing them.

 

Writing the above post, the lower photo headings were above the respective coins, but apparently spaces get eaten in the actual post. Sorry.
Coins are Severus Alexander, two Caracallas, and a Julia Domna (probably).

 

Another Severan of the same style as the coins of the "Laodicea" mint (now attributed by the British Museum as being minted in Antioch).

Julia Domna, AD 193-217.
Roman limes falsum Æ denarius, 2.26 g, 18.2 mm, 1 h.
Uncertain mint but of "Laodicea" style, AD 196-202 (or later).
Obv: IVLIA AVGVSTA, bare-headed and draped bust, right.
Rev: CERERI FRVGIF, Ceres seated left, holding corn-ears in right hand and long vertical torch in left hand.
Refs: Cohen 16; cf. RIC 636; cf. BMCRE 592.​

This particular limes denarius of Julia Domna was known to Cohen, who cataloged it as a "petit bronze," no. 16, separate from the denarius, no. 14.



Cohen apparently didn't know what to make of these limes denarii. He does the same for this limes of Plautilla (no. 11), which he calls "core of a fouree denarius or petit bronze."

 

I remain of the opinion that this subject will not be understood to any degree in the next several generations, certainly not as long as the establishment looks down on the matter as unworthy of serious investigation. It is hard enough to study something with clearly defined parameters (like coins of a specific mint) but quite another matter to organize things that only have in common that they are not something already defined. The best possible study of unofficial coins of Britain in the Third Century tells us nothing about other times and places where one or a hundred people made coins for reasons wholly unknown. Necessity, larceny, by order of the Emperor, on one occasion. Techniques and available technology can not be expected to follow a set pattern as it might today when people interested in the subject might watch YouTube videos or read Counterfeiting for Dummies. I can not say that I would suggest a brilliant young scholar to embark on a lifetime study of a subject so vast as to have the real possibility of never rising to a level acceptable to the 'peer review' system with 'peers' who know nothing and have no interest in the subject. That leaves it to a thousand monkeys with a thousand typewriters writing away what they see and not being bothered by coins they can not explain. I have no expectation of seeing this change in my lifetime or in that of great grandchildren yet unborn. I liken it to the status of space travel when hot air balloons were all the rage two centuries ago. Meanwhile I will embrace the mystery and enjoy the coins about which I know more 'nothing' than 'anything'. A few photos of my favorite unknown, uncertain and unsupported by current scholarship coins of Septimius Severus (one of thousands or subdivisions of the question):

 

Interesting thread. Here's a limes denarius of Septimius Severus that has been broken somewhere along the line:


Septimius Severus Limes Denarius
(200-201 A.D.)
Rome Mint?
[SEVER]VS AVG PAR[T MAX], laureate head right / [PR]OVID AVGG, Providentia
standing half-left, holding wand over globe to left and sceptre.
RIC 166; RSC 586
(1.90 grams / 18 x 12 mm)
eBay Sep. 2019


In a big batch of ancients from fellow CTer @tenbobbit I got a couple of interesting limes. Here are my favorites:

Severus Alexander - the workmanship on this one is quite nice, if perhaps not entirely "official":


Severus Alexander Æ Denarius
(c. 222-228 A.D.)
Limes Imitation of Rome Mint
IMP C M AVR SEV ALEXAND AVG, laureate, draped bust right / AEQVITAS AVG, Aequitas standing left, holding scales and cornucopia.
Imitative based on RIC IV 127c.
(2.35 grams / 17 mm)
@tenbobbit Oct. 2021

This one may fall into the realm of "barbaric imitation" - like one of those imitating radiates of Tetricus or Victorinus (and kin). But not radiate, so I'm guessing Caracalla or Geta was the original model, but it is so crude and blundered I doubt it ever fooled anybody as being from the imperial mints:


Caracalla / Geta Æ Denarius
(c. 190s-210s A.D.)
Limes Imitation of Rome Mint
Blundered/worn legend, laureate head right / [C]OS III, jug and lituus
No reference?
(1.78 grams / 15 x 13 mm)
@tenbobbit Oct. 2021

 

Roman Republic
AE Victoriatus
Anonymous issue after 218 B.C. (15.7 mm, 2.21 g, 11 h).
Rome mint.
Obv: Laureate head of Jupiter right
Rev: in ex ROMA, Victory standing right, crowning trophy.
Ref: Sear 49; Crawford 44/1; Sydenham 83; RSC 9 (exc struck AE)
Ex: RBW Collection