Hi Please look at my Hadrian I purchased some time ago. Can you place the typology RIC, guess condition. Thanks, Mammothtooth
First thing that leaps out at me is, that's Hadrian. A lot of his legends have some version of 'Trajan Hadrianus,' in honor of his adoptive father.
No worries! With the first denarius I ever bought, exactly the same thing happened! Guess that gave me inside information. ...Come to think of it, it fooled the dealer, too! Another fun thing you can do with this, and lots of Roman imperial coins, is date the coin from the reverse. That's Aequitas, holding scales and a cornucopia. The reverse legend is a string of abbreviated titles of Senatorial and other official offices Hadrian held. "PM TRP COS III" can be rendered, "Pontifex Maximus [High Priest of the state religion]," "Tribunica Potestas [holding the power of a Tribune]," "Third year as Consul [...from 119 CE]." Hadrian didn't update the date of his consulship after that. Other people here know more detail about the full implications of that, but as early in the reign as 119, Hadrian would be only likelier to still be referring to Trajan.
The PM TR P COS III can be helpful in narrowing down the dating. Edit: looks like RIC II 385 to me: http://numismatics.org/ocre/id/ric.2_3(2).hdn.385
Sorry, @Justin Lee, I was adding the second part of my last post while you were sending yours. Not Cricket....
My first denarius was Caracalla but it said ANTONINVS PIVS. I thought it was a fake or something but no, it’s just the way it was
As @hotwheelsearl pointed out, there are lots of variations from the common modern names. "Caracalla" is actually a nickname. ...So is Caligula; who else... One thing that would really help you out (@Mammothtooth) would be any edition of David Sear, Roman Coins and their Values. Like Wildwinds, it's far from comprehensive, but the exceptions run to being serious rarities. And it has all kinds of introductory matter, covering commoner reverse types, mints, and so forth. Along with full names of every emperor, and all the main variations of their names and titles. ...Hoping you could find an older edition for cheap. Mine goes back to 1974, but, to come clean, I used it for your Hadrian. It's very good for getting your bearings on this stuff.
You're cordially welcome. It's fun to remember my early collecting days. Enlightened self interest, sort of.
Maybe it’s a trick of the lighting and camera angle, but the edges seem weird to my old eyes. Can you post a picture of the edges?