Catching the Roman fever

Discussion in 'Ancient Coins' started by Pavlos, Sep 17, 2018.

  1. Pavlos

    Pavlos You pick out the big men. I'll make them brave!

    Maybe someone can remember me saying that I did not find Roman Imperial coins that interesting, well... hmm they do have something actually, well actually they look really nice. Roman republic coins are really nice as well, I find the detail of some of those coins equal to the art of Greek coins.

    Anyway I decided not too make it too ridiculous because I just started collecting ancient coins, and I want to keep my focus on the Greek coins and also the Byzantine anonymous follis. However, I do want to have a little Roman coin set and I decided, well I am collecting Byzantine anonymous follis because of Christianity, what Roman emperor is not better at that then Constantine the Great!

    I was looking at the coins from Constantine I and well the first thing I noticed is that only 1 emperor had so many different reverse designs and on top of that the diversity of the mint sites, from Syria to Gallia to Italy to Greece etc. I am really confused, why are there so many different designs for the reverse?

    For example these 2 follis from Constantine I both minted in Constantinople.

    [​IMG]
    [​IMG]

    They have a similar design but are still different, why is this? It is minted in the same city.

    To make the Constantine collection not too big and related to the Byzantine Empire, I preferably want his coins which are minted in Greece or Minor Asia for example Constantinople, Thessalonica, Nikomedia etc (but its not a must).

    Also, I am especially very interested in his coins containing the "Chi Rho" (because of the relation to Christianity), are these coins rare and/or expensive?

    For example:
    [​IMG]

    or

    [​IMG]

    Thank you very much!
     
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  3. Gavin Richardson

    Gavin Richardson Well-Known Member

    The coin with the standard over the serpent is the "Holy Grail" of Constantine LRBs. It is also very frequently faked. I think a genuine one in decent shape would fetch $1000 at auction, but I'll let others weigh in on that.

    Constantine himself did not have the Chi-Rho feature on many of his coins. The Chi-Rho really is developed as a motif by his sons and their rivals (e.g., Magnentius.). I'll quote our own Victor Clark here: "People who expect to find Christian imagery on bronze coins of Constantine will be disappointed. Of approximately 1,363 coins of Constantine I . . . covering the period of 313-337, roughly one percent might be classified as having Christian symbols.”

    To trace the development of the Chi-Rho on coins, @Valentinian has a great site: http://augustuscoins.com/ed/Christian/ChristianSymbols.html

    The nice thing is that plenty of coins featuring the Chi-Rho can be had for $50 or less. Here's a version of that scarce Constantinople Commemorative with a Chi-Rho for $58: https://www.vcoins.com/en/stores/ro...e_with_chi_rho_on_reverse/463094/Default.aspx

    Just go to vcoins.com and search "chi rho" and sort from low to high to find coins within your budget in conditions you find collectible.
     
    Last edited: Sep 17, 2018
  4. Gavin Richardson

    Gavin Richardson Well-Known Member

    As far as why all the variations on Constantinian coinage, one simple answer might be the fact that he has coins struck for him for over 30 years. He just reigns a long time, and as the sole Augustus for a good bit of it. That translates into a lot of coins. And each mint will have their own artistic take on a design.

    But why the variations within the same type, even within the same mint, such as for the GLORIA EXERCITUS reverse type? I have no idea. Perhaps such variations serve as control marks, allowing a mint controller to know which officina at which time was producing coins for quality control purposes.
     
  5. dougsmit

    dougsmit Member

    Coins with the mintmark PCONST or SCONST are Arles rather than Constantinople. For a short period the city was renamed after Constantine II but reverted to Arlatum after his death.
    https://books.google.com/books?id=9...age&q=arles renamed after constantine&f=false
    The first two differ in size and date with the two standards coins being earlier and larger. They are usually better made than the later and lighter one standards coins.
    I do not have a nice Constantinople example but below is the one I do have.
    rv5020b02138lg.jpg
     
  6. gsimonel

    gsimonel Well-Known Member

    As Doug said, the reduction from two to one standard was to denote the reduction in the size of the coin that occurred around 335 C.E. The size of the follis (or nummus) declined steadily throughout Constantine's reign, from around 27 mm at the beginning . . .
    [​IMG]
    (Ticinum mint, A.D. 306
    RIC 75
    Obv: CONSTANTINVS NOB CAES
    Rev: VIRTVS AV-GG ET CAESS NN - Helmeted Mars, advancing right, with transverse spear and holding trophy over shoulder
    ST in exergue; [dot] in left field
    27mm, 10.6 g)

    . . . to around 15-16 mm by the time of his death:
    [​IMG]
    (Heraclea mint, A.D. 335-337
    RIC 150
    Obv: CONSTANTI-NVS MAX AVG
    Rev: GLOR-IA EXERC-ITVS - Two soldiers with spears and shields; one standard between them
    SMHA in exergue
    16 mm, 1.4 g.)

    The earliest appearance of Christian imagery on a coin of Constantine that I know of is a silver medallion from Ticinum in 315 C.E.:
    upload_2018-9-18_8-51-3.png
    If you draw a line from Constantine's mouth through his nose and all the way up to his helmet you will see a Chi-Rho in a circle. (This is not my coin or my photo. I found this picture on the internet.) This was a special presentation piece and was not intended for circulation. The first appearance on circulating coinage was the cross on the reverse of this coin from 316 A.D., also from Ticinum:
    [​IMG]
    Ticinum was a minor mint, so it seems unlikely that either of these coins reflects the will of Constantine to officially promote Christianity. A more likely explanation is that the celator who carved the dies was a Christian who was celebrating the official end of the persecution of the Christians and felt free to incorporate Christian symbolism in the design and control marks of the coins.

    I have a web page showing a lot of the different types of bronzes struck during the reign of Constantine. It is by no means complete, but it does give of good idea of the variety of coins struck over this 30=year period:

    http://feltemp.com/Constantine_1.html

    And don't forget to check out @Valentinian's site that Gavin Richardson mentioned.
     
  7. Gavin Richardson

    Gavin Richardson Well-Known Member

    A snippet from a book I just bought.
    Title: Coinage in the Roman world
    Authors Andrew Burnett, Daphne Nash
    Publisher Seaby, 1987
    Original from the University of Michigan
    ISBN 0900652853, 9780900652851
    Length 168 pages

    IMG_5626.jpg IMG_5627.jpg
     
  8. Constantine I Follis 1.png
    I totally understand how you feel. The Diversity of the coins is outstanding! Here I have a Constantine follis from London. Just to find this in the Sear books takes me quite a while.
     
  9. Archeocultura

    Archeocultura Well-Known Member

    There was a time when I set out to get every type of coin from every mint during the reign of Constantine. That alone was an impossible quest. Now I only collect coins from Arelate cq Constantia (modern Arles in France), but now with every small variant there is (textbreaks, symbols etc). This very limited area contains well over 1050 different coins between 313 AD and roughly 340 AD when Constantius II struck the last type already in use during his father's reign.
     

    Attached Files:

  10. ancient coin hunter

    ancient coin hunter 3rd Century Usurper

    A camp gate type of Constantine, some silvering left. Under my avatar you will see the phrase IN HOC SIGNO VINCES - "In this sign thou shalt conquer." Here is a bit of background information (Wikipedia)...

    The historian bishop Eusebius of Caesaria states that Constantine was marching with his army (Eusebius does not specify the actual location of the event, but it is clearly not in the camp at Rome), when he looked up to the sun and saw a cross of light above it, and with it the Greek words "(ἐν) τούτῳ νίκα" ("In this, conquer"), a phrase often rendered into Latin as in hoc signo vinces ("in this sign, you will conquer").

    At first, Constantine did not know the meaning of the apparition, but on the following night, he had a dream in which Christ explained to him that he should use the sign of the cross against his enemies. Eusebius then continues to describe the Labarum, the military standard used by Constantine in his later wars against Licinius, showing the Chi-Rho sign. The accounts by Lactantius and Eusebius, though not entirely consistent, have been connected to the Battle of the Milvian Bridge(312 AD), having merged into a popular notion of Constantine seeing the Chi-Rho sign on the evening before the battle...

    cons1.jpg

    cons2.jpg
     
  11. Gavin Richardson

    Gavin Richardson Well-Known Member

  12. Sallent

    Sallent Live long and prosper

    When I saw the title "catching the Roman fever" my first thought was that this thread had to do with the smallpox plague of 165-180 CE, also known as the Antonine Plague. :yuck::confused:

    Glad to see I was wrong. Nice coins everyone.
     
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  13. Pavlos

    Pavlos You pick out the big men. I'll make them brave!

    Thank you so much for all the information guys! Somewhere in the upcoming week I will be reading a lot more about the coins of Constantine the Great. Thank you @dougsmit for telling me that these are not Constantinople mints, I think Constantinople should be CONSP rather then PCONS? Very unfortunate, the top one had a really nice reverse.

    I had this coin in my mind as my first ever Roman coin, not that good quality I guess but it attracts me because of the mint in Thessalonica and that it is a quite big follis (25mm).

    [​IMG]
    [​IMG]

    But maybe I will wait and I hope to get some Constantine coins with Christian symbols, as I prefer them a lot more.
     
  14. Severus Alexander

    Severus Alexander find me at NumisForums

    Finding early chi-rhos (certainly Christian symbols, at least on Constantinian coins) is difficult, but with some patience you should eventually be able to locate one from the Arles mint struck in c. 334. Earlier than that is next to impossible, though I was lucky to get this example of the Trier Crispus type (c. 321-322) described in the Burnett and Nash book above. Warren (i.e. Valentinian) has the best known example.
    Screen Shot 2018-09-20 at 1.22.25 PM.jpg
     
  15. ancient coin hunter

    ancient coin hunter 3rd Century Usurper

    I was searching for the medallion above and noticed the reverse, which is quite interesting - it depicts Constantine on a rostrum addressing a cavalry troop. The soldiers are depicted with nimbi (plural of nimbus) around their helmets. Given that Christian iconography is visible on the obverse, does this refer to additional Christian imagery? If anyone knows please chime in.

    medallion.jpeg
     
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  16. gsimonel

    gsimonel Well-Known Member

    RIC VII Ticinum 36 - Here's how the coin is described in RIC, as copied from Wildwinds:
    "SALVS REIPVBLICAE, emperor in military dress, standing left on platform, trophy across left shoulder, crowned by Victory with palm branch; nine soldiers standing around, four in the foreground holding horses, others with shields, the two in the background at the sides of the platform holding standards."

    So what look like nimbi are, at least according to RIC, the shields hanging from the backs of 4 of the background soldiers. This seems more likely than having 4 soldiers with nimbi and 5 without.
     
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  17. Jwt708

    Jwt708 Well-Known Member

    Just curious, is there any evidence of this, or is it speculation? Honest curiosity.
     
  18. gsimonel

    gsimonel Well-Known Member

    Evidence of what? That it was meant to reflect the Christian beliefs of an individual celator? If it was an official attempt to promote Christianity, then it would most likely have been on all the coins, like the labarum on some of the Fel Temp types.

    "Celebrating . . . " was probably a poor choice a words. A better way to state it is that they were added by a celator who, post edict of Milan and the official toleration, now felt free to include Christian symbols in his repertoire of control marks.

    But you are correct that this is just speculation. It could have been simply a random symbol, but the timing--the fact that there were no crosses before the Edict, but they appear shortly thereafter--suggests that they had some connection to the personal beliefs of the celator. Keep in mind that celators (die engravers) were slaves, albeit well-treated ones, and Christianity initially flourished among slaves and the poor.
     
  19. ancient coin hunter

    ancient coin hunter 3rd Century Usurper

    Great! Thanks @gsimonel - I was kind of curious about that but a second look shows that they are shields, a more likely answer than halos.
     
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