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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;Valentinian, post: 3639381, member: 44316&quot;]X bar denarius:</p><p>[ATTACH=full]976859[/ATTACH] [ATTACH=full]976858[/ATTACH]</p><p><br /></p><p>Head right, GRAG behind, crossed X before neck/quadriga right, L.ATES below. Moneyer: L. Antestius Gragulus. c. 136 BC.</p><p>&nbsp; If the denarius really did change from 10 to 16 asses and this coin is later, according to seriation (see <a href="http://augustuscoins.com/ed/Repub/dating.html#seriation" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="http://augustuscoins.com/ed/Repub/dating.html#seriation" rel="nofollow">this page</a> for a discussion of seriation), maybe this new symbol means 16. Hill [p. 49] and BMC [p. 118] thought this was still just X for ten with the crossbar in the middle instead of crossing the top. Hill thinks [p. 49] that denarii of 3.90 grams (even before moneyer&#039;s names were on coins) were &quot;the equivalent of 16 asses of uncial weight.&quot; He has the mark &quot;X&quot; retained anyway, and says of this crossed X, &quot;That mark, indeed, was probably by this time regarded a denoting the name rather than the value of the coin&quot; and &quot;This does not mean XVI, as some have supposed, but is merely X differentiated as a denominational mark by means of a horizontal stroke.&quot; This last observation seems unwarranted to me. If you think a denarius is 16, as he says it is, why interpret a symbol that might mean 16 as 10?</p><p>&nbsp; What is really going on with X, XVI, and then X again is still the subject of controversy. Crawford and others date some &quot;X&quot; pieces after the &quot;XVI&quot; and &quot;X&quot; pieces. Was the revaluation rescinded?</p><p>&nbsp; Inspection of the main numismatic sources shows authors prefer to avoid the issue, presumably because they do not have a convincing answer. Hill discusses later coins with &quot;X&quot; without mentioning the X. See the third coin above (of c. 141 BC) with XVI for what BMC wrote, which we now think must be wrong. Also, BMC [p. 125] discusses at length when the moneyer might have coined, but does not mention XVI as a possible change in value associated with financial concerns, nor does it mention a reason for the subsequent reuse of X. Crawford lists the types without any comment on &quot;XVI&quot;.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><b>Next theme</b>:&nbsp; Some other denomination-indicating mark.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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