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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;curtislclay, post: 5311634, member: 89514&quot;]I have two similar middle bronzes, both apparently copper asses, in my collection. It&#039;s always interesting to compare details between different specimens of the same type.</p><p><br /></p><p>All specimens shown or linked to by RC above show Salus holding a transverse scepter with her lowered left forearm. One of mine is similar, but the other shows a variant: the scepter is vertical, so not intersecting with Salus&#039; body or throne, and she holds it with her <i>raised</i> not lowered left forearm. This is a difference I just noticed for the first time, though I acquired the coin in 1990, from Lanz Graz who were selling off the remainders of the extensive Hohenkubin collection of Roman middle bronzes.</p><p><br /></p><p>Two other minor differences: the back of Salus&#039; throne is usually visible above her shoulders, but is sometimes omitted; and the letters S C can be placed either in the exergue or in the lower field, left and right of the snake on altar and Salus&#039; throne respectively.</p><p><br /></p><p>Date of the introduction of the obv. legend FAVSTINA AVGVSTA according to my ordering of the rev. types of the denarius coinage: about August 156, two-thirds of the way through Antoninus&#039; TR P XIX. At about the same time a similar Salus seated type to Faustina&#039;s, but omitting the goddess&#039; scepter, was introduced on Antoninus&#039; denarii with the rev. legend TR POT XIX COS IIII, and the same type was later continued with the date TR POT XX. Possibly these two Salus types were contemporaneous, meaning that Faustina&#039;s asses could be dated from Antoninus&#039; denarii to the same years 156-7. But this is just a possibility; I have not been able to reconstruct from solid evidence the order and exact chronology of Faustina&#039;s AVGVSTI PII FIL rev. types.</p><p><br /></p><p>Another possible idea: New Year&#039;s asses were sometimes struck with their own rev. types, not shared with other denominations. RC, are you sure your example is a dupondius rather than an As?</p><p><br /></p><p>I think Strack notes three specimens of Faustina&#039;s Salus type in Munich and one in Paris, rather than the other way around. I am unaware of any hoards containing many of Faustina&#039;s Salus asses; the Sacred Spring deposit at Bath contained only one specimen.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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