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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;dougsmit, post: 7605604, member: 19463&quot;]For those new to the concept:&nbsp; In addition to being the large bronze of the Roman Empire, the sestertius was the common unit of account. Caligula was said to have spent three billion sestertii but that does not mean there ever was that number of coins.&nbsp; At 4 to a denarius and 25 denarii to an aureus, 3,000,000,000 IIS would only be 3,000,000 aurei unless the conversion was done in the old system once used in the UK where a billion was a million million rather than a thousand million.&nbsp; How much did Caligula spend?&nbsp; A lot.&nbsp; Nero reduced the weight of the aureus from 1/40 to 1/45 Roman pound.&nbsp; Just to get a rough figure we might use 7.5g and a weight for one aureus.&nbsp; 3 million times 7.5 would be 22.5 million grams which at about $61 a gram would only be about $1.4 billion or about the cost of a non-championship sports team.&nbsp; In some circles, this is chump change.&nbsp; I ask the mathematically inclined to check my math and compare to what else we could buy if we were to win a billion or two in the lottery.&nbsp; I probably dropped a decimal somewhere but this only values those aurei at melt so it would be more if we were dealing in Caligula aurei in the high roller market.&nbsp; What do those sell for now?&nbsp; How big would a bag of 3 billion be?&nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>For the benefit of our newer members, someone who owns both please take a photo of a Republican silver sestertius resting on a Caligula or other First century bronze.&nbsp; I don&#039;t own a silver one.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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