Newest Roman Republic Denarius

This is my latest Repubic coin:

L SCRIBONIUS LIBO AR Denarius Cr416/1a., Scribonia 8a, Rome mint c. 62BC

OBV: BON EVENT LIBO, diademed head of Bonus Eventus right
REV: PVTEAL above, SCRIBON below, well-head ornamented with garland and two lyres, hammer at base
3.99g


A little background information:

 

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Is it solid or fouree? I only ask as there appear to be a couple of surface breaks. It could just be my eyes playing games again....

Martin

 

Gorgeous coin, Bing ....

=> ummm hey, by "newest" did you mean my most recently purchased, or did you mean my latest/youngest Roman Republic?

Hi

 

I see nothing suggesting fourree.

 

A Sulla Relation :O

The Dictator of Caesar's Childhood... Along with Caesar's second wives grandfather!

I like :thumb:

 

My most recently purchased is the following:
P. Nerva AR Denarius
113-112 BC
Rome mint
Diameter: 17 mm
Weight: 3.86 grams
Obverse: Helmeted bust of Roma left, holding shield and spear; crescent above, mark of value before
Reverse: Three citizens voting on comitium: one voter receives ballot from attendant below, another voter places ballot in cista; P on tablet above bar
Reference: Crawford 292/1; Sydenham 548; Licinia 7
Other: 6h, VF, iridescent toning, traces of porosity, scratch at 9 o’clock on reverse under tone





My latest/youngest is the following:

RomanRepublic
Moneyer issues of Imperatorial Rome
Mn. Cordius Rufus AR Denarius
46 BC
Rome mint
Diameter: 19 mm
weight: 3.73 grams
obverse: Diademed head of Venus right
reverse: Cupid riding dolphin right
reference: Crawford 463/3; CRI 65; Sydenham 977; Cordia 3a
Other: 10h, Toned VF

 

Beautiful stuff!

 

It is solid. The mark on the obverse is a banker's mark I believe, but I have no idea what the mark on the reverse might be.

Jerry: This is my latest Roman Republic purchase. I have a few younger than this. And I do so love your Republican coins. Especially the P. Nerva. I'm going to have to find one for me. I was watching an Ebay auction today of another Republican coin with an interesting reverse. Two solders participating in a ceremony involving the killing of a pig. I almost went for it, but decided to wait.

I'm glad you all like this coin. I'm always on the look out for coins with interesting reverses, or a reverse that tells a story.

 

Is fouree even found on earlier issues? I've read that it was the last step in the debasement of the Denarius that began with Nero and eventually lead to Diocletian's reforms. Or do you find it in other eras?

 

I have a Republican fouree dated 102BC

C Fabius C F Hardrianus Fouree Denarius Crawford 322/1
OBV: EX•A•PV behind veiled & turreted bust of Cybele right
REV: C•FABI•C•F, victory in biga right; stork below
3.28g, 20mm

 

Fouree means Ancient fake.

It is found on most issues

 

Awesome coin jw, looks like the mark was made from a tool, the two marks are about the same one on the right side and one on left.Steve very nice as well..:thumb:

 

Numiswiki has this...

So I'm not sure if I'm using the term correctly. Does the coin have to be a plated counterfeit to be called fouree? Or does the term just refer to the plating? Can an officially-issued silver-plated coin be called fouree?

 

I'm not sure...
I know of the Plated Athenian crisis issues... Which I have seen called fouree..

But late Romans always seem to be called silver washed, not fouree

Doug?

 

It is strictly a plated contemporary counterfeit. They very rarely occur in bronze plated lead, really only on the large Ptolemaic bronze drachms.

 

Fourree means plated. Who made them is not what makes them plated. Most traditional scholars claim all fourrees are fakes made outside the mint. I say that can not be proved. Certainly most fourrees are fakes but there is no reason that some of the crooks could not have been mint workers or bosses. It is also possible that some were ordered from higher up. We can not prove anything.

Generally, I prefer to use 'fourree' to mean coins produced by one specific technique where precious metal foil was wrapped around a base metal core with the intent of fooling someone into thinking the coin was solid when it was not. There are plated coins made by methods other than the foil wrap but they are relatively uncommon until the Severan period when the debased official coins were decreasingly worth faking by the complex foil method.

I believe late Roman silver washed coins were washed to indicate that their alloy contained a small amount of silver even though that amount was too little to make the coin look silver. That is a small but important difference.

My views and a lot of photos of plated coins are on my pages linking from:
http://www.forumancientcoins.com/dougsmith/fourree.html

Read the best book on the subject:
Campbell, William, Greek and Roman Plated Coins Numismatic Notes and Monographs No. 57, American Numismatic Society, 1933.

Typical foil fourrees:

 

There seems to always be an academic discussion about whether fourees were just counterfeit money of their times or were they more official in nature.

 

Let me throw another coal on the fire, do you think that what limes coins started out as, outside kingdom, denarius then wrapped in silver, they use 90% less silver in each coin.. just food for thought, the coin they used to copy are pretty nice..Like my Tiberius. Could this be a limes,who knows..

 

Nerva fouree -

:devil:
:devil::devil::devil::devil::devil:

 

A few thoughts...

This is what Suarez says in the introduction to ERIC...

So I think Doug makes an very good point when he says...

I'm guessing the officially silver-washed coins were indeed meant to remind the citizenry that there WAS some silver in the issues, and the washing was not meant to deceive. After all, how could they have fooled anyone? The gradual debasement of the denarius had been going on since Nero's time - everybody knew they were getting less and less silver in their coinage.