Need help identifying a coin.
1946Hamm
Posts: 783 ✭✭✭✭✭
My son brought me this coin and I need to know what it is. It is between 13mm and 14mm. Any help appreciated. Thanks.
Have a good day, Gary
1
Comments
It looks like Constantine II, Constans or Constantius II, with a VOT XX MULT XXX reverse. Possibly an eastern mint.
Thanks, I know nothing about ancients. What year span and does it have any value?
To elaborate a little further: it is a coin known generally as a "Late Roman Bronze". We don't know exactly what the Romans called them, as records from this time period concerning the monetary system are quite scarce and ambiguous . We tend to call them "follis", "nummus" or just "AE4", which is archaeologist-code for "small bronze". It dates from some time in the mid-300s AD.
Roman coinage at this time was in something of a decline; portraiture had become somewhat identical-looking, idealized and cartoonish, rather than the realistic portraits of classical times, so for coins we kind of need to be able to read the legends in order to identify them properly. In this case, half of the legend is missing off the flan, and the half that we can read - "D N CONSTA" - could apply to several emperors. The reverse design - a wreath with the inscription "VOT XX MVLT XXX" in the middle - could also have been issued by any of those emperors, so it doesn't help narrow things down. Constantius II is probably the most likely candidate. Unfortunately, the mintmark below the wreath is also illegible.
Without a full attribution to emperor and mint, this coin will not be of much interest to collectors. It's the sort of coin an ancients coin dealer will likely put in a bowl with a sign saying "Late Romans - $5 each". It's a nice enough coin for someone who just wants "a Roman coin" for their collection.
Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius, "Meditations"
Apparently I have been awarded one DPOTD.
Thank you
I think we can be slightly more precise.
I don't think Constantine II had one of these reverses as he was dead by 340 and these were struck in AD347-348 for Constans and Constantius II.
The only mints striking this coin were Alexandria, Antioch, Constantinople, Cyzicus, Herculea and Nicomedia - all in the east.
...and I think the obverse legend is DN CONSTA-NS PF AVG. So it's Constans, pearl diademed, from Alexandria, Antioch, Constantinople, Herculea or Nicomedia. Although that still only narrows it down to about a dozen coins.