You appear to have the same coin as me, which is an as of Domitian with the VIRTVTI AUGUSTI reverse. RIC II 709 Edit: It could also be a dupondius (Domitian issued dupondii with the same reverse) but I can't see whether the emperor is laureate or radiate.
I'm starting to worry now . Is it, IMP CAES DOMIT AVG GERM COS XVII CENS PER PP on the obverse like mine? Can't really make out from the photos.
Will be interesting to see if any more of these pop up, I bought mine in a mixed lot which will be returned to sender.
Mine just doesn't feel right, maybe someone who is more familiar with this type can give their opinion. Not saying either is fake I just have my doubts, had a bad week on the coins front overall so maybe jumping the gun a bit.
Then when I was browsing the forum and saw your post I felt like I had to chirp in! I usually just like to read different threads and admire the coins.
Radiate/laureate refers to the type of crown the emperor is depicted with. Laureate = laurel wreath and radiate = radiate crown. The coin is a common type, at least from what I've seen.
in my opinion it is 100% original coin. It is not expensive and it makes no sense to fake it and still in such a bad condition.
I think you could be right, can't find a die match for either and seems to be relatively common type. It was the €450 somebody paid for the example on wildwinds that got me thinking!
To illustrate what Romancollector--not often we get posts by Romancollector and Roman Collector one after the other--wrote, I went to Wildwinds and copied a couple of photos. Here's an example of Domitian wearing a radiate crown: Here's an example of him wearing a laurel wreath crown:
http://www.forumancientcoins.com/dougsmith/glosshead.html In 1998 I posted the above page on the subject of portrait types. If there is anything new to you there, feel free to look. Copying the old code to this reply destroys the formatting so I would suggest ignoring what is below and visiting the page for these and a couple doze other terms every new collector should know. Hadrian dupondius Radiate Head Right In the middle of the first century AD the Romans began to use a crown of spikes on the portrait on the dupondius to help distinguish it from the as. On dupondii the crown was only used on portraits of the Augusti and never by Caesars or Augustae (Imperial women). Postumus antoninianus Radiate Draped Bust Right Later, the same radiant crown was used to distinguish the antoninianus (double denarius), the double aureus and the double sestertius. By the third century AD, style required most portraits to be busts rather than heads so this is the most common form found on antoniniani. Unlike the dupondii, antoniniani of Caesars show the crown.