pius 548 rare and an even rarer variant

[Diederik]

The early series of Antoninus  will always yield new variations:
ANTONINVS AVG PIVS PP  is the new title for 139, but the COS II series itself is very small, apart from the Coronarium coins (Africa, Asia etc).
This coin has [tr POT] around, COS II in exergue and S - C in the fields. It makes imho a new variant as the one so far known by Cohen (867) and repeated by RIC (548) and quoted in the Blacas collection by BMC on page 180, all give TR POT COS II around and nothing in the exergue. I finally found a coin at Ritter's which is a decent example of the above. Mine is a poor one, unfortunately.


Frans

[curtislclay]

Actually the Paris example reported by Cohen 867 has COS II in exergue, like yours. It is illustrated by Strack pl. VIII, 802; from different dies than yours. Strack 802 and Cohen 867 both misdescribe this piece, by not mentioning that the COS II is in exergue.

Strack 802 lists a second example of this coin, in Bologna. One wonders whether it is of the same variety as yours and the Paris coin, or the one with COS II in the circular legend.

I have a specimen from the same dies as the Ritter coin you show, with COS II in circular legend.

Another conundrum: BMC p. 180 copies Cohen's description as no. †, meaning not in BM collection, but in the footnote they assert that the BM now has such a coin. But there was no such coin among the eight that came up when I searched their online collection for Antoninus sestertius Securitas. It looks as though that notation "Now in B.M." may have been misplaced in the BMC footnote, and was meant to apply to some other coin.

[Diederik]

Well, that clears up a lot! Now we may wonder which variety is the rarer, although that would be an academic question as the both are, imho.
Thanks for checking both BM and Strack, Curtis; I am in the South of France without my books and only some digital data.

Frans