Happy Birthday to Caesar Augustus

I've also wondered if they were related, but haven't seen the question addressed anywhere. Similarly, there was a moneyer during the Republic (ca. 106 BCE) named C. Sulpicius Galba, and I've wondered if he was related to the Emperor Galba. Although they were further apart in time than the two Othos.

 

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I have four coins of Augustus (including the COL NEM dupondius). I'd also like one issued when he was known as Octavian, but the ones I've seen have all been too expensive for me.

Augustus AR Denarius, 19 BCE, Colonia Patricia Mint. Obv. CAESAR AVGVSTVS, bare head right / Rev: SIGNIS RECEPTIS and SP QR, above and below; aquila (left) & standard (right) flanking shield incribed CL V. RIC I 86, RSC I 265, Sear RCV I 1633. 18mm, 3.8 g. [The Senate awarded Augustus the 'shield of valour' (clipeus virtutis) for recovering the standards lost to the Parthians by Crassus.]



Augustus AE (Brass) Dupondius, 9-3 BCE, Colonia Augusta Nemausus [Nîmes] (Galla Narbonensis province) Mint. Obv. Heads of Agrippa left and Augustus right, back to back, with Agrippa wearing combined laurel wreath and rostral crown, and Augustus wearing oak wreath, IMP above heads and DIVI F below [Imperator Divi Filius] / Rev. Crocodile right standing on two palm branches, chained to palm-shoot standing behind it, with tip of shoot leaning to right; wreath above and to left of palm-shoot, with long ties extending behind shoot to right, COL - NEM to left and right of palm-shoot. “Type III” of Augustus & Agrippa/Crocodile coin (see https://multicollec.net/1-mo-h/1h04). RIC I 158 (p. 52), RPC I 524 (see https://rpc.ashmus.ox.ac.uk/search/browse?volume_id=1&number=524), Sear Greek Imperial Coins 157 (D. Sear, Greek Imperial Coins and their Values (1982)], Sear RCV I 1730 (ill.). [See Sear RCV I at p. 337: Commemorates conquest of Egypt in 30 BCE; influenced by Augustus’s settlement of veterans of Egyptian campaign in Nemausus after colony was founded in 27 BCE.] 28 mm., 12.09 g.



Augustus AR Denarius, 2 BCE-13 AD Lugdunum [Lyons] Mint. Obv. Laureate head right, CAESAR AVGVSTVS DIVI F PATER PATRIAE/ Rev. Gaius & Lucius standing front, each with a hand resting on a round shield, a spear, & in field above, a lituus [curved augural staff] right & simpulum [ladle] left [in "b9"-like formation], AVGVSTI F COS DESIG PRINC IVVENT; C L CAESARES below. RIC I 207, RSC I 43, Sear RCV I 1597, BMCRE 533. 18 mm., 3.9 g. (Purchased in Frank Robinson auction, 2020.)



Augustus, Æ As, 11-12 AD Rome Mint. Obv. IMP CAESAR DIVI F AVGVSTVS IMP XX Bare head of Augustus to left / Rev. PONTIF MAXIM TRIBVN POT XXXIIII around large S•C. RIC I 471, BMCRE 275, Sear RCV I 1689, Cohen 226. 27 mm., 9.98 g, 7 h. Brown surfaces with some green patina. Ex: Nomos, Obolos 11 (December 8, 2018), lot #489.



This last one is one of the few Augustus coins I've seen in which he doesn't seem to be portrayed as a young man. He was famous, of course, for never permitting his portrait to age, so perhaps his looking older is just a function of the surface, and wasn't intentional?

 

I had no idea what that was, but I guess it is!

 

I am sorry to say that I don't have a single coin of Augustus. I did have a few at one time, but must have sold them back in the last Ice Age.

I do have my Livia dupondius, which I have posted before, but, to mark the occasion of Augustus' birthday today, and mine as well, although I am hardly a measure of him, I did do a re-shoot of Livia's coin. I think this result is much better than the previous photo.