Watch List notes:

Caligula. 40-as; Caligula; 37-41 AD, Rome, 40-1 AD, As, 10.86g. BM-73, Paris-121, C-29, RIC-54 (R ). Obv: [C C]AESAR DIVI AVG PRON AVG P M TR P IIII P P Head bare l. Rx: [V]ESTA S - C Vesta seated l. holding patera and scepter. Scarce with this date; most surviving VESTA asses date from Caligula's first tribunician year, with TR POT in obverse legend. Caligula has evidently undergone damnatio memoriae on our specimen, in that his praenomen C (for Caius), and for good measure the adjoining C of CAESAR too, have been deliberately eradicated after his assassination in January 41 and the Senate's subsequent condemnation of his memory. Other bronze coins of Caligula showing the same method of damnatio by eradicating the C for Caius in his name have been collected in an article by Hans Jucker.Damnatio could lead to the withdrawal, remelting, and reminting of a condemned emperor's coinage with the types of his successor, but on some bronze coins of Caligula his types and portrait were allowed to survive, and just his praenomen was removed to indicate that his memory had been condemned. VF
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