(Ex) Senatus Consulto / Consultum

[FORVM AUCTIONS]

We have a Republic coin inscribed SC (no ex) and we described the SC as being short for "Senatus Consulto" - and I think most other dealers write the same.
Someone emailed and suggested it is incorrect grammar, correct being "Senatus consultum".

Unless I am mistaken, ex senatus consulto is definitly correct (ablative?) but what is the correct form when the EX is removed?
IS S C a further shortened form of EX S C, or is it somehting else, referring to the "ideea" of Senate decision in general, and not a particular individual decision of minting that exact issue?  I feel there is a difference here, and I hope I was able to make myself clear...

Thanks!

Alex

 

[slokind]

Curtis will be more certain of his answer than I am, but I am reasonably confident that the initials, standing alone, can either be read taking 'ex' for granted or as an ablative absolute, usually translated somewhat awkwardly (English lacking an absolute construction, though I just came as close as possible to making one) as 'the Senate having decreed' or 'by decree of the Senate'.  All ablatives are adverbial in nature: when, where, how.
I don't think that a nominative would stand naked on a coin except as a label, and even that is the exception.  That is why persons who didn't take Latin in school are prone to talking about 'the Genio' (which is actually a dative): one seldom sees 'Genius' on a coin.
Of course, they didn't have to issue a fresh decree for each issue, so it doesn't matter if we want to think of S C as simply marking senatorial coinage.
Pat L.

[curtislclay]

You are right, S C = Senatus Consulto, "by decree of the Senate."

EX S C = Ex Senatus Consulto, "on the basis of / in accordance with a decree of the Senate."

I think the meaning is essentially the same, whether you include or omit the EX.

In both cases "consulto" is ablative, required by the preposition EX in the second case, needed to give the sense "by" in the first case.

Senatus Consultum would be the nominative or accusative case, leaving the sense mysterious, as though you wrote "a senatorial decree" in English.  "Yes, but why are you mentioning it?" the viewer would ask.  "What relevance does the decree you mean have to this coin or its types?"

[SVLLAIMP]

Now, as a current Latin student, I would have to believe that the phrase would be entirely ablative since ex, which I consider understood even if its not there, takes the ablative.  Thus I would think it to read (EX) SENATU CONSULTO.  This is the only way I can satisfy agreement in the ablative.

[curtislclay]

But Consultum is a decree or answer, and Senatus is a genitive, telling you whose decree it was: "of the Senate."

Moreover if EX isn't there, there is no way that it can be "understood."  The ablative in Senatus Consulto is an ablative of agency or means or the like; it does not imply an omitted preposition.

[SVLLAIMP]

Okay, that makes sense.  I suppose I just find the genitive a little superfluous and want an ablative instead.  But after looking at my Sallust I find it was definitely used as a genitive/ablative pair.  It just still feels like it should be an ablative phrase instead, perhaps of origin, manner, or means.

[slokind]

Sulla and Curtis have reminded me that I don't need to invoke an absolute construction, since 'Consulto' can be taken as an ablative of means, as in the old Latin I example, Agricola servos tuba vocat, which I hope no longer appears in textbooks.  The farmer wouldn't use a tuba-trumpet, and whether the servos are to be understood as serfs or slaves is a classroom diversion from the grammar (this is early in the course, when the 3rd declension hasn't been introduced).
It is important to remember that our list of ablative of this or that was unknown in antiquity.  Latin speakers would simply have known from learning Latin in their families to say senatus consulto in reading off the coin, and they'd pronounce the long u of the 4th-declension genitive singular, which cannot be marked in the font used here.
Pat L.

[SVLLAIMP]

Actually if you have a Mac with the character palette activated you can use macrons.  See, ā ē ī ō ū.

[Jay GT4]

This may seem immature but this topic really reminds me of this...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IIAdHEwiAy8

[SVLLAIMP]

"DATIVE!!!"
"No, no sir, accusative, accusative!"

[areich]

Titus, I never would have said so myself but that's exactly how I often feel.
That scene is also very close to every Russian lesson I ever had, even after 8 years it didn't get much better. 

[slokind]

Sulla:
ē senātūs consultō.  Voilà.  Pat L.
And I just found a lunate sigma, too.
Lazily, I've just been using the old ASCII key combinations I learned years ago.

[FORVM AUCTIONS]

Thanks everyone for the comments, much appreciated!