Featured The Death of Constantine

Hello all! This will be the first of hopefully many small writeups featuring lovely coins obtained from @tenbobbit.

Constantine I is often considered the "first Christian emperor" although I do not believe that is entirely accurate. He did halt the vicious persecution of Christians in the Roman Empire, but I believe he wasn't really a true, card-carrying Christian himself for a two reasons.

1. In these days, it was not necessarily uncommon for emperors to adhere to multiple religions, and worship multiple gods.
2. He was not baptized until death.

1. Legends say that Constantine had a dream in which a deity instructed him to paint the Chi-Rho symbol on the shields of his troops for a guaranteed battle victory. In hoc signo vinces - "by this sign you will conquer."
He did so, and won, and figured that maybe worshipping a Christian deity would be beneficial.
However, he did also patronize and adhere to some beliefs of the Roman religion; statues and artwork under him still featured a plethora of Pagan gods.
Thus, it seems like he was a pragmatic type of guy and would worship whatever god helped him out.

2. In most Christian religions, one is not considered a member of that sect until their baptism, either at birth or during adulthood.
Constantine, however, was not baptized until he was on his deathbed, due to a strange belief that holding off on baptism would expunge more sins than an earlier baptism.
Thus, in most modern Christian beliefs, he was not a card-carrying member until he died, which doesn't really "count."

This brings us to his death. Apparently he died of some sort of terminal illness and was laid to rest in the Church of the Holy Apostles.
Unfortunately this church is no longer extant, but probably looked much like this:


Within this church, his body was laid inside a magnificent Imperial Porphyry sarcophagus, befitting a powerful and wealthy emperor. Remember that Imperial Porphyry was often worth more than its weight in gold, and was considered the supreme expression of imperial power and wealth.
Unfortunately, this coffin is also no longer extant, save for one small fragment in an Istanbul museum:


However, we can assume that his coffin looked at least somewhat similar to the sarcophagus of his daughter, Constantina. You can see the resemblance in the vegetal structures on the fragment. The style of Constantine's tomb was probably somewhat more refined than that of his daughter, especially in the rendering of Cherub bodies.


Now, the coins.

After his death, his sons deified him and issued a series of commemorative coins featuring an obverse bust of Constantine with a veiled headwear, signifying deification. Although they are not marked as such, the coins were issued by Constantine II and Constantius, but curiously not his third son, Constans.

These coins were all AE 3 and 4 sizes, with no clear reason why some of the same type are differently sized. They seem to range from 13mm to 18mm or so.
The coins come in three distinct reverse types:

1. The quadriga. This is a really neat one since it features a lot of activity on a small flan. Constantine himself pilots the quadriga while reaching up towards the Hand of God that is reaching down to him. This is pretty clear Christian imagery, showing that God is basically taking him up to heaven. It seems that Constantine's link to Christianity was exagerrated somewhat post-death.
The reverse comes in several varieties, mainly different orientations of the horse front legs. Some of these, such as those from Antioch look very creepily spider-like. These Cyzican horses look more normal.

Obv: DVCONSTANTI-NVSPTAVG. Shrouded head of Constantine right.
Rev: Anepigraphic. Constantine in quadriga reaching up to hand of God.
Mint: Cyzicus, SMKD
Ref: Cyzicus RIC VIII 19 (probably)
Weight: 1.3g
Diam: 16mm AE4

2. The standing shrouded figure. This one is quite simple, but pretty effective for the message it conveys. Apparently Roman rulers earned a shrouded outfit when they were deified. We can see this in the obverse of all of these coins. This one goes one step further and displays a full-length shrouded standing figure. These coins all seem to feature four letters, two on each side, but I don't know what they mean.

Obv: DVCONSTANTI-NVSPTAVG. Shrouded head of Constantine right.
Rev: Standing shrouded Constantine facing right. VN-MR.
Mint: Cyzicus SMK-
Ref: RIC VIII 54 (probably)
Weight: 1.6g
Diam: 15mm AE4

The pose of the figure is actually quite similar to this over-lifesize statue of Faustina I from the Getty Villa:


This leads me to believe that this pose was a somewhat standardized one. Also, I believe that a slew of these statues would have been distributed amongst the Empire for cult worship and honorifics, although none seem to exist today.

3. The last of the three reverse types issued features Aequitas standing, holding scales. I don't really know much about this symbology, nor do I own one of these coins, so I hope that someone else can chime in.

Thanks for reading

 

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Chariot variety (uncleaned hoard example). I guess by awaiting baptism til the time of death Constantine was avoiding sin. He certainly had a lot to worry about in that department. One other thing he did: he gave his mother Helena unfettered access to the Imperial treasury to build churches and monasteries throughout the empire including Jerusalem (Church of the Holy Sepulchre) and Mt. Sinai (St. Catherine's Monastery).

 

Thanks for sharing! Looks like you may have one of the more spider-looking horses.

 

Yeah they are a bit spidery-looking.

 

Nice coins and write up..
I will say that for point #2: Constantine was not baptized until death.
This was actually a very common practice for early Christians as they firmly believed that continuing to sin after baptism ensured their eternal damnation. So leaving the baptism until your deathbed increased your odds of salvation... as weird as that sounds. Added bonus of removing all of those sins these Emperor-types performed during their lifetime.

I don't yet own any posthumous coins of Constantine.. here is a coin of his I re-shot today while I was playing around with a new iPhone clip-on lens.

 

That’s such a bizarre concept for me, but hey you gotta do what you gotta do to get to heaven!

really nice coin too. I like how his eyes are looking upward

 

There's a 4th type

Constantine I
Arles mint
337 to 340 AD
AE 4
Obvs: DIVO CONSTANTINO P, Constantine veiled right.
Revs: AETERNA PIETAS, Emperor holding globe and spear. X to right, PCONST
14x15mm, 1.41g
RIC VIII 17, Vagi 3150

I'll add this showing all 4

 

Nice write-up, @hotwheelsearl ! The VM MR on the reverse of your AE-4 from Cyzicus is an abbreviation for venerabilis memoria, "revered memory."

Here's mine, from Nicomedia:


Divus Constantine I, AD 307-337.
Roman billon reduced centenionalis, 1.69 g, 13.8 mm, 11 h.
Nicomedia, 4th officina, AD 347-348.
Obv: DV CONSTANTI-NVS PT AVGG, veiled and draped bust, right.
Rev: VN-MR either side of Constantine, veiled and togate, standing right; SMNΔ• in exergue.
Refs: RIC viii p. 475, 57; LRBC I 1155; Cohen 716; RCV 17469.

 

Not so bizarre, at least not for Catholics. You should think of baptism back that as part of the "last rites". Baptizing babies is a fairly recent development. In the past, you needed to be old enough to understand what baptism signified before you could take part in it.

And Constantine was definitely Christian, probably even before his supposed dream. Most likely he was introduced to Christianity as a child by his mother, Helena. He consulted with and was tutored by Christian theologians throughout most of his adult life, and even called the Council of Nicaea in 325 A.D. in an attempt to resolve differences within and the church and figure out just what, exactly, Christianity was and stood for.

 

Here is a pair from Alexandria.....

Obv:- DV CONSTANTINVS PT AVGG, veiled bust right
Rev:- Emperor, veiled, in quadriga right, the hand of God reaches down to him
Minted in Alexandria (//SMALA) 337 - April 340 A.D.
Reference RIC VIII Alexandria 12



Obv: DV CONSTANTINVS PT AVGG, veiled bust right
Rev: VN | MR, Emperor veiled standing right
Minted in Alexandria (//SMALD) 337 - April 340 A.D
Reference:– RIC VIII Alexandria 32

 

I'm glad these coins have sparked a real interest and curiosity. It’s lovely to see what a gesture of generosity can do.

I think we mainly have Jacob Burckhardt (Die Zeit Constantins des Grossen, 1853) to thank for the persistent view that Constantine adopted Christianity only as a political measure and not out of genuine belief. I don’t think that view is widely held today among Constantinian scholars such as Timothy Barnes. Peter Leithart’s Defending Constantine sees him as very, very Christian indeed. Although Leithart may overstate his case, my sense is that scholars working today believe Constantine took his Christianity quite seriously, which does not preclude a political use of that religion as well. When the Roman Emperor had traditionally served as the pontifex maximus to the gods, such use might not be unexpected. It was certainly not peculiar to Christianity.

Still, Burckhardt’s thesis persists, and I think the issue of Constantine’s Christianity often serves as a kind of Rorschach test for the person examining it. It results in the kind of reductive and unnuanced disparagement that prefaces Constantine’s coins on Wildwinds, which is unfortunate.

 

I'm curious what the chariot signifies in Christian eschatology. I'm theorizing that it might have more to do with Sol and his horses as an expression of god. Remember that he struck oodles of the SOLI INVICTO COMITI type.

As far as I know chariot references in the bible were old-testament happenings. At this time the bible was still being organized into canonical books that we know today. They left out a significant amount of material that passed for scripture in the day, such as the Nag Hammadi Codex books and others that were deemed heretical.

 

I think you're right that this chariot has more to do with Sol than with Christianity--further evidence of the syncretism of Sol and Christ that apparently did not trouble the Romans that much. Even Constantine's Christian biographer Eusebius speaks of Constantine rising with Sol: "Just as the sun rises and spreads the beams of its light over all, so also Constantine shone forth with the rising sun from the imperial palace, as though ascending with the heavenly luminary, and shed upon all who came before his face the sunbeams of his own generous goodness.” Eusebius, Life of Constantine, 1.43.3.

 

And as Victor Clark has noted, Eusebius speaks of this particular coin: "At the same time coins were struck portraying the Blessed One on the obverse in the form of one with head veiled, on the reverse like a charioteer on a quadriga, being taken up by a right hand stretched out to him from above." Life of Constantine IV 73

 

That's really interesting that Eusebius mentions that particular obverse and reverse type.

 

Here is an AETERNA PIETAS commemorative of Constantine:



14 mm. Crowded and not nice, although okay "for type."
RIC VIII Lyons 1 (Their photo is also of a very crowded coin) Struck 337-340.
(Arles 40 on plate 6 with this reverse shows the full reverse.)
Carson CRE 708 is the same coin.
Bastien Lyon 337-363 #3 has (only) four examples, all smaller and only one almost as nice as this lousy example.
@David@PCC and @Bing each showed one of this type above.
A search on
AETERNA PIETAS Constantine
at acsearch brings up three, all crowded.

I get the impression this type is never well-struck with a full flan. If anyone has one, I'd love to see it!

 

Here’s one, marred by a Cheetos patina, alas
https://www.vcoins.com/en/stores/at...portrait_unlisted_in_ric_/866299/Default.aspx

 

That would be a great coin without the cheetos patina. They erroneously call it "unlisted in RIC." However, it is RIC VIII Lyons 32 on page 206. (Arles mint.) Maybe they didn't know to look for "PCON" under Arles. I wrote them and told them.