Those of us addicted to the Eastern mint denarii of Septimius Severus get happy when we find another we didn't have and bore he rest by showing them as if they are special. They are special only because there are fewer of each than there are people who care (both are very small numbers). I show this new one mostly for Martin to reply with his similar coins. This coin has the least common of the Fortuna reverses used by the mint: Fortuna posing as Pietas with the legend not abbreviated. I have a few of this type but would buy more if the price were right. The same show had a more common Fortuna type in EF+++ (a really nice coin). I should have at least asked the price but that coin belongs in a different collection. This one belongs in mine. The obverse die is an old friend. I have a few and I will buy them when I see them. Specialists like coins of Emesa with obverse legends that do not end in COS II. This ends in COS. What makes this one special to me is that the die seems to be failing with breaks obscuring some letters at the left. I will be interested to see if Martin has this die with signs of this deterioration. I hope so since it would confirm that the die was falling apart and provide us with an order of use with the various reverses we know with this die. Who cares? We do. This is not a coin for those wanting a denarius of Septimius Severus for a 'one per' collection. It belongs where it is. I paid $35 for it which is too much or not enough depending on who you are.
I'd pay $35 for it, nice addition and I haven't seen that reverse type before for that mint. Now that it's out there, i'm sure someone will search it, find this thread, then ask $200 or more on ebay in the future.
They may have trouble finding the coin so they will just fall back on asking $200 for the common type which can be found. Do a search for the Fortuna/Pietas standing with altar and see how many you find. Do a search for the COS die. Do a search for collectors who care. I really should have bought that EF+++ common.
I will break this into two responses. The first on the Fortuna - Pietas reverse. The coin illustrated by Doug (which I allocate to COS II which I will explain later) has the reverse legend FORTVNA REDVCI. The length of the legend is of interest as I believe that in general these legends shorten over time for this issue. This hypothesis is generally unproven and I will see if I can back it up with evidence at some future time. I think that I can pre-date Doug's coin with a COS I coin with a longer reverse legend of FORTVNAE REDVCI, which is one of the listed COS I variants in RIC, RIC Page 139 (5). Barry Murphy illustrates another example from the same die pair on his website. I only have the FORTVNA REDVCI with the full COS II obverse legend. Both intriguingly have SE dot V. Barry Murphy illustrates the following example on his website which I would place slightly earlier than both of mine based on the bust style. The FORTVN REDVC. Barry Murphy has the following example on his website The same reverse type is known from the IMP issues but would appear to be relatively scarcer. FORT REDVC. BMC W444, RIC 479B (R2), RSC 168c. My example illustrated below.
I do keep my eyes open for this obverse die as it is one of those oddities that appears to be COS and little or no evidence of any trailing I or Is. In discussing this obverse die with Curtis Clay he is of the opinion that it should be allocated to the COS II issue. He has seen a small number of them in hand, some in decent condition and is of the opinion that the two small black shadows on my following coin are evidence of two very feint Is. The above coin doesn't help with the die state but is strongly suspect that the die was failing in multiple areas. The area of hair above the ear and into the laurel wreath is certainly progressively weak with my example below being the best preserved version of this area of die that I have seen and is likely fairly early in the life of the die but even then shoes some issues in the hair in this area. Neither example really helps with the legend area that you raise above as the areas of legend are largely off flan. My third example doesn't seem to help either I am afraid. Regards, Martin
If you choose, you can see the tiny marks under the bust of the stars coin as II but my Mars is pretty clean. To answer the question we need more coins in better condition. To me, the die is very early and looks funny displayed with a bunch of 'normal' COSII coins. I do not accept the PEPT of this die and of the COSI die as completely coincidental but I do not propose that the letter was intentionally cut P either. Similarly, the S's tend to look like C's recut as a correction bother here and on the COS I die. They must be the same hand (a concept Curtis consistently dismisses). It will be interesting if a sequence of the Fortunas can be developed but the Pietas style does seem to show up with more than its share of earlier styles. They are not, however the earliest so the use of that die with a very failing obverse makes me want to date the coin in the earliest part of 194. I would like to see that obverse turn up with an IICOS reverse but we have what we have. I remain of the opinion that several of these obverse variations were in use at the mint in the same weeks. We have so many links that cross over that I am sticking to my opinion that the dies were secured nightly with obverses and reverses separated and randomly reassigned the next day. Unless there was an intentional plan to use as many die combinations as possible, this is the only hypothesis I see working.
Gawd, after lookin' at those lousy coins, you dudes must be chompin' at the bit for this sweet stallion, eh? Sorry, my amazing Sep-Sev Gurus => but I just couldn't resist posting my run of the mill, one-n-only Sep-Sev denarius!! Okay, break it up, nuthin' to see here => lets' go back to the higher-brow portion of this cool thread!! => you two dudes "rock" (please keep-up the lesson ... we love it!!)
I very much like these erudite discussions. Doug and Martin should really put their heads together and write a book on the subject. I would be one of the dozen people that would buy it. I have only one denarius of S. Severus from Emesa, and it is merely a "nice coin" - Fortuna as Fortuna, of no arcane numismatic interest at all. I've posted it too often, but maybe somebody hasn't seen it.
That is a very nice coin and exactly what I would recommend as the one and only Eastern denarius of Septimius if you are to have only one typical specimen.
