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Coin Type: Silver denarius of Commodus, Caesar 175-176 CE, Augustus 177-192 CE Mint and Date: Rome, 188-189 CE Size and Weight: 17mm x 18mm, 2.40g Obverse: M COMM ANT P FEL AVG BRIT Laureate, bearded head right. Reverse: SECVR ORB P M TR P XIIII Securitas seated left, holding out a globe in her right hand, legs crossed, her left elbow resting on a statuette of a winged sphinx. Exergue: COS V P P Provenance: Incitatus Coins (Vcoins), July 2010 Ref: RCV (2002) —; RIC III 179. BW Ref: 025 050 161 |
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Note: The sphinx armrest is not present on all specimens of this coin. On 15 July 2010, Curtis Clay said on the Forum Classical Numismatics Discussion Board: "This variant not noted by the usually sharp-eyed Cohen. No mention of it on denarii in BMC, and the two illustrated specimens indeed omit the sphinx. BM 108, sestertius, pl. 108.7, however, notes the sphinx in a footnote: "Arm-rest on rev. shaped like sphinx (?)." No mention of the sphinx in the brief discussion of this type in Kaiser-Raiss' dissertation on Commodus' coins, p. 39. I indistinctly recall noting the sphinx on denarii before; maybe I wrote it into my BMC that I lost to bagsnatchers in 1999! Or maybe I just noted it on another sestertius like BM 108. I don't know whether this detail has ever been noted and discussed in the scholarly literature; I rather suspect not." | |
| The content of this page was last updated on 16 July 2010 |