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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;Cinco71, post: 7621060, member: 117791&quot;]I&#039;d think of course the emperors for the most part would want an idealized version of themselves on their coinage.&nbsp; Nearly everyone has an ideal, if not necessarily entirely realistic, version of themselves that they try and portray to the world.&nbsp; Just take a glance at social media and people&#039;s portraits of themselves and how many filters and whatnot are applied.&nbsp; Now imagine you know that image will be seen by millions everyday for years.&nbsp; How careful would someone be with what they put out to the masses?&nbsp; They&#039;d want something that projects a powerful image, reflects how they see themselves, but also contain (at least in the first half of the empire) recognizable features.&nbsp; The classic case of this is Augustus.&nbsp; Until he died he always portrayed himself as a man in the prime of his life on his coins.&nbsp; We&#039;ll never know what he looked like in his last few years.</p><p><br /></p><p>Take at look at your own country&#039;s modern currency (if it contains portraits) and count how many pimples you see.&nbsp; It&#039;s nearly impossible to know exactly what someone looked like unless you got to be in the room with them.</p><p><br /></p><p>That said, as far as Roman coins go I think you look for a consensus both with what is on the coinage and also any statutes/busts that still exist.&nbsp; Somewhere in there you get an idea of what they looked like in real life, but you&#039;ll never get the warts and all version.&nbsp; Have to wait for time travel to get invented for that one.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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