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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;Gavin Richardson, post: 3267246, member: 83956&quot;]So I’m going to apologize ahead of time for my long-windedness. Feel free to just scroll and look at the pictures. I’ve really had a fun year adding some 40 coins to my collection and making progress on my Constantine specialty and my Twelve Caesars project. I’ve also enjoyed making virtual friendships on this board and learning a lot. Here are ten coins that have brought me particular pleasure in 2018:</p><p><br /></p><p>10. CONSTANTINE AS CAESAR, MARS REVERSE</p><p>[ATTACH=full]860878[/ATTACH] </p><p>My main collecting focus is Constantine. You might reasonably wonder why he is not more represented in my Top 10 list, but much of my Constantine collecting involves mint completion and that sort of thing. I picked up about a dozen new Constantine coins this year; here’s a representative. It’s a bit rough, but it’s a big, heavy, and fairly rare issue of Constantine as Caesar with a Mars strutting on the reverse.</p><p><br /></p><p>9. CONSTANTIUS CHLORUS LONDON FOLLIS.</p><p>[ATTACH=full]860880[/ATTACH] </p><p>I’m woefully weak in coins of Constantine&#039;s father. This coin is a means of addressing that weakness, and the fact that it’s an AMCC 1 win ex James Pickering makes this coin extra special to me.</p><p><br /></p><p>8. AGRIPPA &amp; AUGUSTUS, NEMAUSUS CROCODILE</p><p>[ATTACH=full]860881[/ATTACH] </p><p>I actually ended up with two of these; I sold one to [USER=91240]@SeptimusT[/USER] (though I still miss its fine portrait of Augustus). I like this one because Agrippa’s rostral crown is clear. And I can count every link in that chain! In my romantic imagination, I would like to think that this very coin passed through the hands of some aged veteran who looked at it and was reminded that he was really there at Actium, decades earlier, when Rome finally brought Cleopatra’s Egypt under its sway.</p><p><br /></p><p>7. NERO SYRIAN TETRADRACHM</p><p>[ATTACH=full]860884[/ATTACH] </p><p>This was a coin I saw and had to have. The infamous Nero was probably the first Roman Emperor to persecute Christians and Jews—scapegoating the former for the fire that ravaged Rome in 64 A.D. Christians at Rome were easy targets; they were either from the East or had embraced an Eastern religion, and their unusual monotheistic faith made them terrible Roman citizens who would not participate in the civil religious observances that kept Rome in the gods’ good graces. So how did a citizen of the East—of the Levant and Asia Minor—envision this man? Perhaps not as the luxurious glutton of Roman imperial coinage, but as the more svelte and severe figure on this coin. This would be the face of Nero for the Eastern Christian of the first century, represented here in a tetradrachm likely struck in Syria ca. 62-63 A.D., just before Rome’s Great Fire that would change everything.</p><p><br /></p><p>6. ELAGABALUS AS PRIEST OF THE SUN</p><p>[ATTACH=full]860885[/ATTACH] </p><p>This coin was a “CoinTalk purchase,” meaning that I would not have been aware of this coin or the unusual protrusion (aka “horn”) from the head of Elagabalus had it not been for this board. I was discussing purchase options and budget on CoinTalk when [USER=19463]@dougsmit[/USER] offered this coin right at my budget point. I snapped it up quicker than you can say “dried bull penis.” And now I can boast of a having a Severan denarius “ex Doug Smith.”</p><p><br /></p><p>5. VITELLIUS AS</p><p>[ATTACH=full]860887[/ATTACH] </p><p>Spoiler Alert: You know a man is serious about completing a Twelve Caesars set if he gets coins of Vitellius, Galba, and Julius Caesar all in the same year. I was sort of partial to the “shaking hands” reverse of Vitellius, but the civil war propaganda of “Liberty Restored” was also pretty attractive. Due to his short reign, Vitellius bronzes are a bit scarce, so finding one with decent detail in MA Shops was too good to pass up.</p><p><br /></p><p>4. COMMODUS AS, THE “ROMAN HERCULES”</p><p>[ATTACH=full]860889[/ATTACH] </p><p>I don’t really know Stevex6; he left CoinTalk soon after I joined. For the time we overlapped, I enjoyed his quick wit and was fortunate never to be on the wrong side of it. I also admired his discriminating taste in coins—whatever he had, it seemed to be of the highest quality. I was sorry to hear he was sick; I hope he is doing well now. During the period when he was selling much of his collection, I was pleased to pick up this Commodus As with the mad emperor as the “Roman Hercules.” I hope it is some consolation that it’s gone to an appreciative home. I’ve already used it in class to discuss the Roman political uses of Hercules.</p><p><br /></p><p>3. DIOCLETIAN ABDICATION FOLLIS</p><p>[ATTACH=full]860891[/ATTACH] </p><p>Of all the coins I’ve ever purchased, this one is among the top in eye appeal, thanks to an attractive green patina. These abdication folles are large and lovely, about the size of a Kennedy half-dollar. They allow for remarkably lengthy obverse and reverse legends, like this one: “DN DIOCLETIANO BEATISSIMO SEN AVG. And what a story this one tells! After solving the administrative headache that was the Roman Empire, Diocletian was going to go home and grow cabbages as green as this coin. Unfortunately, squabbling successors would not make that possible.</p><p><br /></p><p>2. GALBA AS</p><p>[ATTACH=full]860894[/ATTACH] Gotta get a Galba. One of the benefits of being on this board is getting expert buying advice for select pieces. Galba is one of the tough ones. I found what I thought was a good deal on a budget Galba, also from MA Shops. I hijacked [USER=74968]@Orfew[/USER]&#039;s Galba thread and got helpful affirmation from [USER=89687]@ominus1[/USER], [USER=84744]@Severus Alexander[/USER], [USER=87404]@Justin Lee[/USER], and [USER=19463]@dougsmit[/USER]. An especially thorough pros and cons list from [USER=39084]@IdesOfMarch01[/USER] really helped me make up my mind, and I bought the coin and am very happy with it. An unusually fine style for a Galba that helps compensate somewhat for the porosity.</p><p><br /></p><p>1. JULIUS CAESAR LIFETIME PORTRAIT DENARIUS</p><p>[ATTACH=full]860896[/ATTACH] </p><p>So way back in March (3 days before the Ides, to be exact), I joined the JULIUS CAESAR PORTRAIT DENARIUS CLUB. It’s a coin that I thought I might own very late in my collecting career, if at all. Those of you with deeper pockets might wait for a more attractive specimen, but I knew I could not afford a VF example. I PM’d [USER=76194]@Sallent[/USER] soon after the coin appeared and asked him about his buying process and budget implications. His prompt reply was very generous and helpful. Despite its wear, it still has a recognizable portrait of JC, a legible “CAESAR,” a mostly legible “DICT PER[PETVO], and a legible moneyer’s name. The fact that this coin was struck a few weeks before JC’s assassination, and the possibility that this coin might have even catalyzed the assassination, really fires the historical imagination that got me into collecting ancients in the first place. Are there better-looking Roman coins? Absolutely. Are there any more historical? In my opinion, no.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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