Lictor

The personal bodyguard to the emperor. The lictor would be outfitted with a fasces which was analogous in use to the billy club of today‟s police officers.

Encyclopedia of Roman Coins

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Lictores - Lictors, officers established by Romulus, after the example of the Etruscans. They were usually taken from the dregs of the people, but were nevertheless free, and sometimes accompanied by the magistrates they served.

Their functions were various:

• 1st. They walked in procession before the magistrates with faces, composed of axes and rods.
• 2nd. They gave notice to the people to render the magistrates the honour due to them.
• 3rd. They walked before the magistrates in single file.
• 4th. When the magistrates pronounced these words: I, Lictor, adde virgas reo, et in eum lege age, they struck the guilty with rods, and cut off his head.

The dictator had 24 of these officers in attendance with him; the Master of the Horse six; the consul twelve; the Praetor six.

A denarius of the Junia family, bearing on its reverse the head of Liberty, exhibits on its obverse a group of four figures, considered to represent the sons of Junius Brutus, gaurded by the lictors. See BRVTVS.

A Lictor standing with the virga or rod is seen on a brass coin of Antoninus Pius: also on a second brass Liberalitas of Severus Alexander. See likewise the denarius inscribed PROVOCO.