I have been trying to read my Roman coins, which always a challenge for me since I have no talent for foreign languages whatsoever. I took one year of Latin and three years of Spanish in high school. They were easily my worst subjects. (Yea I know, Spanish is easy, but not for me.) At any rate I have been run into this with the legend on the obverse of a Macrinus and a Severus Alexander denarii. Obverse: IMP C M OPEL SEV MACRINVS AVG Translation: Eperor caesar? M? Opellius Sev? Macrinus augustus What is "M"? What is "SEV" in the middle of his name? Obverse: IMP C M AVR SEV ALEXAND AVG Translation: Emperor caesar? M? AVR? Severus Alexander augustus. What is "C M"? What is "AVR"?
Macrinus' full name was Marcus Opellius Severus Macrinus. The IMP C would be like @Valentinian mentioned above.
Thank you. How do you know that " Marcus Aurelius" is part of his name when it is not listed as such?
If you do not already know it, or have a reference book, you can always look up names of Emperors online. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Severus_Alexander
