I need help identifying this coin. Holder says it is a greek quadrans from Carteia (Greek Colony in Spain (Iberia?)), but I have been unable to confirm that information. The inscriptions are M(?) V I R on one side and I can make out C A R T E I A on the other side. Any help with identification/date would be appreciated.
Somewhere, I have a provincial of Augustus, vaguely from the Balkans. What I remember off the top of my head is that the town was a literal Roman colony, settled by veterans' families. Wonder if the 'VIR' in the legend on yours has anything to do with a similar demographic ...?
This coin has IIII before VIR and means the 4 men, or moneyers who were allowed to strike coins for the year. More often you see 3 men, like the quadrans below, from 9 BC, with the names of the men on the obverse-- Lamia, Silius and Annius.
Ah, thanks for that, @Victor_Clark. I always assumed the word 'VIR' had martial connotations. (...Watch This. I never went to a school where Latin was taught, until an interim undergrad course in, wait for it, Conversational Latin. Along the lines of how to order at the (hopefully fictional) McDonald's in Vatican City.)
Victor, There were often two chief magistrates of colonies, therefore called duoviri (IIviri), but sometimes there were four, called quattuorviri or IIIIviri. These magistrates were often named on colonial coins, and their duties and powers were quite different from those of the IIIviri or IIIIviri monetales of Rome, who were responsible just for the coinage of Rome itself. See the article Duumviri in Stevenson's Dictionary of Roman coins, pp. 351-2.
