Diocletian Mintmarks

[284ad]

I just bought a new follis of Diocletian today from my local coin shop and upon getting it home have been quite confused by the mintmark on it (I'm usually strictly a Severan enthusiast so this is all new to me)

Every reference I find to this type of Diocletian has a letter to the left and either a letter or a star to the right of the genius yet mine has nothing to the right. I looked and could only find a coin of Contantius I with a similar mint mark denoting the 1st officina or the Trier mint.  Yet every coin of Diocletian from the 1st officina has the two symbols.

Anyone care to shed some light on this for me?

[moonmoth]

According to Helvetica's lists, this should be RIC VI Trier 152a, rated S for scarce.

Bill

[284ad]

Thanks for the ID moonmoth that helps.

Though I'm still intrigued as to why have different mint marks for the same officina of a mint.

[moonmoth]

The marks often changed from issue to issue over the period of a year or two.  Presumably the mints wanted to be able to see, not just which workshop had produced a coin, but which production run it came from.

Bill