The sequence of previously known
obverse legends for
Caracalla from 195-9 on
denarii at the
mint of
Rome, then, was:
1.
M AVR ANTONINVS
CAES, c. Nov. 195
2.
M AVR ANTON
CAES PONTIF,
Spring 197
3.
IMP CAE M AVR ANT
AVG P TR P, c. Feb. 198
4.
IMP CAES M AVR ANTON
AVG, 10
Dec. 198
5. ANTONINVS
AVGVSTVS, c. March 199.
Assuming that the new
legend,
M AVR ANTONINVS
AVG,
was not just an unusual contemporaneous variant of
legend 3 or
legend 4, but was Caracalla's
standard obverse legend for a short time and fits in the above sequence, I am inclined to place it between legends 3 and 4, beginning on 10
Dec. 198 and pushing the introduction of
legend 4 to a few weeks after that date.
The evidence
comes from the two
reverse types.
The only other known occurrence of the
IVSTITIA type at
Rome around this time is on the unique
sestertius in BM, which has the longer
sestertius version of
legend 4, with ANTONINVS instead of ANTON. This seems to date the use of this
type at
Rome to late 198-early 199, though surprisingly it was used EARLIER on Caracalla's new-style
Eastern denarii, so apparently
Rome copied it from that
mint, rather than
vice versa as usual. Usually it was
ROME that initiated a
type, and the Eastern
mint then copied the
type from
Rome.
FIDES PVBLICA was a
type of EARLY 198, first appearing for
Caracalla still as
CAES PONTIF (7 spec. in
Reka Devnia), then for him as
Augustus with
legend 3 (31 spec. in the
hoard). The
type only barely made it to the end of the year: it does occur with
obv. legend 4, but is very
rare with that
legend (
RIC 19, citing Atti e memorie 1925. Wrongly made Eastern in the 2nd ed. of
BMC, p, 284: I have a specimen, and it is
mint of
Rome).
FIDES PVBLICA is therefore explicable in combination with the new
obv. legend if we place that
legend in
Dec. 198, between legends 3 and 4, but seems out of place if we date the new
legend to c. March 199, between legends 4 and 5. By that time the
FIDES PVBLICA type had apparently been out of use for several months.
Briefly to consider the other two possibilities for the placement of the new
obv. legend:
(1) Between legends 2 and 3, as Caracalla's first
obv. legend as
Augustus at
Rome? That dating fits very well with the
FIDES PVBLICA rev. type, which was certainly current just when
Caracalla was promoted from
Caesar to
Augustus. However, the
IVSTITIA type causes difficulties: the BM
sestertius seems to date its use at
Rome to almost a year later, after 10
Dec. 198 or early in 199.
Nor would this early dating at
Rome mean that the Eastern
mint might then have copied this
type from
Rome, since on new-style
denarii the
IVSTITIA type occurs combined with an original
obv. legend of
Caracalla that the
mint clearly invented to record Caracalla's promotion to
Augustus, before it could know of the
legend Rome would choose when the news from
Mesopotamia reached
Italy a month or so later. Moreover, it seems probable that Caracalla's first
obv. legend as
Augustus at
Rome would include ALL of
his new titles,
IMP and TR P as well as
AVG, so
legend 3, which does include them all, should precede the new
legend, which omits
IMP and TR P.
(2) Could the new
legendM AVR ANTONINVS
AVG have been used in c. March 199, between
4.
IMP CAES M AVR ANTON
AVG and
5. ANTONINVS
AVGVSTVS?
This would seem the logical order if we assume increasing contraction:
legend 4 omits P and TR P, the new
legend then omits
IMP CAES, and finally
legend 5 omits
M AVR too. However, March 199 seems too late for the
FIDES PVBLICA rev. type, as already noted above. Moreover, we know that the
rev. type SECVRIT ORBIS was in use when
obv. legend 5 superseded
obv. legend 4, since this
type passes from
legend 4 (8 spec. in
RD hoard) to
legend 5 (probably 4 spec. in the
hoard). So if the new
obv. legend intervened between legends 4 and 5,
SECVRIT ORBIS is the
rev. type we would expect it to occur with, not
FIDES PVBLICA and
IVSTITIA!
As to the
aureus of
Caracalla and
Geta that Ignasi mentions,
RIC 17, with a
Caracalla legend very similar to the new
denarius legend , namely
M AVRELIVS ANTON
AVG (see image below):
it cannot be of 198, since it shows Geta's second
obv. legend as
Caesar,
P SEPT
GETA CAES PONT, not
his first
legend,
L SEPTIMIVS
GETA CAES.
It is unclear to me exactly when this change of Geta's
obverse legend took place: whether by end 198, in which case the
aureus could be contemporaneous with the new
denarii, or only later, in which case the
obv. legend of the new
denarii was revived somewhat later, and somewhat differently abbreviated, for the
aureus.
