My first Sestertius

Thanks for the kind words jamesicus. I've already sold my collections twice before. Hopefully no more selling off anytime soon.

 

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You can't see much on this worn sestertius of Tiberius, except for the very clear NCAPR countermark- but the countermark is the primary reason I added it to my collection.



(36mm, 24.88 g).

 

I love sestertii , possibly my favourite to collect at the moment. Here’s my first one I ever purchased about 15 years ago now (Trajan) and my latest expenditure the other day of Marcus Aurelius
TRAJAN AE orichalcum sestertius.
Struck 103-111 AD. IMP CAES NERVAE TRAIANO AVG GER DAC P M TR P COS V P P, laureate bust right. Reverse - S P Q R OPTIMO PRINCIPI, Fortuna standing left, holding rudder resting on prow and cornucopia. RIC 500.

Marcus Aurelius, 161-180. Sestertius Rome, struck 173-174 AD.
M ANTONINVS AVG TR P XXVIII Laureate and cuirassed bust of Marcus Aurelius to right, seen from behind.
Rev. IMP V COS III / S - C Jupiter seated left on throne, holding Victory in his right hand and long sceptre with his left. BMC 1472. Cohen 252. RIC 1098

 

I forgot to show the contrast of a Roman Republic Sestertius compared to the Sestertius from Augustus' reform:


RR AR Sestertius 211-208 BCE vs RE AE Sestertius Marcus Aurelius CE 161-180

 

Coincidentally, I have the same Tiberius sestertius with the same countermark

I think it started life as RIC 48.


ATB,
Aidan.

 

Well. That didn't last long. Can we all please amend what I said earlier to something like "I'm going to limit myself to two sestertii"?

I was browsing ancient coins at VCoins late last night, and simply couldn't resist. I was powerless. Besides, it was from a reputable seller (Incitatus Coins) and was under $200, so I didn't feel particularly worried about its authenticity, or particularly guilty about spending the money. I know I'm tempting fate because obviously it hasn't arrived yet, and I know that it isn't in the greatest condition (at least compared to the silver coins I tend to buy), but here's a photo:

Marcus Aurelius, AE Sestertius, 173 AD, Rome Mint. Obv. Laureate head right, slight drapery on left shoulder; M ANTONINVS AVG TR P XXVII / Rev. Marcus Aurelius standing left, holding scepter with left hand, and, with his right hand, raising by her right hand a kneeling figure of Italia, who holds a globe with her left hand; [RESTITVTORI ITALIAE] IMP VI COS III [bracketed portion off flan]. RIC III 1078, Sear RCV II 4997, Cohen 538. 30mm, 25.8g. [Purchased from Incitatus Coins, June 2020.]



According to David Sear (see RCV II at p. 315), this coin "commemorates the deliverance of Italy from the threat of barbarian invasion resulting from the emperor's successes in his wars against the Germanic tribes of the Danubian region."

 

That's lovely! I like a chocolate brown patina.

 

LOL, yeah, it...gets...worse...



My Carthage Horse Head compared to Japanese Pteranodon, as described by a fellow CT'er.

 

I knew you would
Great addition

Q

 

Congratulations on the second of what I hope will be a hundred more sestertii. Incitatus Coins is what I consider among the best of the current VCoins sellers. I have bought a few coins from Incitatus over the past few years including at least two in my top 100 favorites.

My Aurelius sestertius was $205 in 2013. Mine has more wear but has more of the ITALIAE on the flan so I consider the two somewhat equal. I would prefer mine with even more wear if that would get me a stronger RESTITVTOR since I am more of a legends and surfaces fan than one who requires unworn coins.

 

My first sestertius...if I am remembering correctly..



One from Incitatus Coins:

 

@DonnaML .......Not addictive then?.....Lovely addition and really like the straggly beard....Cool coin!....Nice choice....Paul

 

I believe Mark Antony issued large AE sestertii with dual portraits that are very rare. Someone here once posted a coin from that series but I think it was a smaller fraction. The most common Augustus sestertii have no portraits but use moneyer names. A lot depends on whether you accept coins not issued from Rome as sestertii just because of their size. What is the largest coin of the Octavian / Caesar series? I know some here have those. I don't.

 

Excellent choice beautiful coin , you can’t go wrong with a Marcus Aurelius sestertius !

 

@dougsmit, thanks for your wish! I hope that either I have enough money someday, or live long enough, or both, to buy a hundred more sestertii -- along with all the other kinds of coins I might want to buy.

All other things being equal, I would certainly also have preferred one with the RESTITVTOR ITALIAE portion of the reverse legend visible. But I thought the nice obverse portrait, and the relatively low price, made up for its absence. Also, there were only two other examples for sale on VCoins in which that part of the reverse legend was visible at all:





The first one was $70 more than mine, and in general I didn't like it as much as mine anyway. (Among other things, the green patch on Marcus's shoulder looks like there's a pit under it.) The second one was 500 euros, and although it's very nice, the RESTITVTOR barely shows, and the price was way more than I was willing to spend. Of course I could have been patient and waited for the perfect combination of quality and price to come along, but I had no interest in doing that! Besides, in looking at all the other examples in the CNG archives -- and there weren't all that many to begin with -- it appeared to me that for whatever reason, examples with that part of the reverse legend either absent or barely readable comprise the substantial majority of these coins. So I might have been waiting a long time.

 

I completely agree with your choice.

 

You made an excellent choice, in my opinion, but I wonder if the reason the second example is € 500 is that the portrait is with a cuirassed bust (RIC 1080; BMC 1452), rather than a right-facing head.

In any case, yours is much higher grade than my well-circulated example:

 

I believe you are correct. I don't not have Harl's book handy, but I BELIEVE that I read it that Anthony had a sesterius-like coin minted, and the irony was Augustus eventually reformed the sestertius to Antony's size. However, since Augustus "won", then he was credited to changing the Roman Sestertius. All from memory, as I have all my books packed away.

 

The seller does identify the coin as RIC 1080, so perhaps you're right that that's the explanation, at least in part, for the comparatively high price. Still too much for me!

 

Lovely 2nd sestertius, Donna. Keep 'em coming.

I got my first "restitution" sestertius recently, but it is one of Hadrian's, for Africa. At $17.50 it was certainly attractively priced, but, you get what you pay for.

Hadrian Æ Sestertius
(134-138 A.D.)
Rome Mint
[HADR]IANVS AVG COS III PP laureate, draped bust right /[RE]STITVTORI AFRIC]AE SC, Hadrian togate, standing left raising up Africa, kneeling left, [corn-ears growing between].
RIC 941f; Cohen 1226.
(21.57 grams / 32 mm)