Roma Numismatics Ltd
Auction XXIII 24-25 Mar 2022
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Commodus AV Aureus. Rome, AD 187-188. M COMM ANT P FEL AVG BRIT, laureate, draped and cuirassed bust to right / P M TR P XIII IMP VIII COS V P P, Genius, nude, standing to left, sacrificing out of patera with outstretched right hand and holding corn-ears in left. RIC III 167 var. (no drapery or cuirass); C. 531 (not cuirassed); BMCRE 245 var. (no drapery or cuirass); Biaggi 1003 var. (not cuirassed); Calicó 2303 var. (same); Roma XXII, 821 var. (same, hammered for £25,000). 7.34g, 21mm, 6h.
Fleur De Coin. An apparently unique and unpublished variant of a type rated 'R2' by Calicó.
From the Altstetten Collection, kept in the vault of Crédit Suisse Geneva (documentation available upon request) since 26 November 1969.
In contrast to the internal turmoil centred on his court, Commodus' reign was mostly uneventful from the military point of view. Apart from a war in Dacia of which few details survive, the greatest contest Roman armies faced was in Britannia when in c. AD 181 the northern tribes breached Hadrian's Wall and, according to Cassius Dio "proceeded to do much mischief and cut down a general together with his troops" (LXII.8). The identity of this individual is uncertain, but it may well have been the provincial governor Caerellius Priscus, indicating a serious state of affairs indeed. Alarmed, Commodus dispatched a previous governor, Ulpius Marcellus to counter the invasion. Marcellus prosecuted the campaign with punitive raids north of the border, possibly even as far as the southern highlands, before ultimately withdrawing back to Hadrian's Wall. By 184 the situation in Britannia was stabilised and victory was declared; Commodus took the title 'Britannicus', and this became a feature of his coinage, recurring again and again in the legends on the obverses of his coins, such as the present (BRIT). As a result of the success of this campaign, and possibly his victories over the Sarmatians, Commodus also took the title 'Felix' (blessed) in this year as we see in the abbreviation FEL in the present coin.
The year before, Commodus had engaged in some similar titular propaganda, when he added the name Pius to his list of official titles (P), an adoption which 'looks like a direct appeal to the memory of the beloved Antoninus: Commodus insists that he is the true heir - perhaps also that the impiety of the family quarrel is entirely on the other side' (RIC III p.358). These additions demonstrate the taste that Commodus had for self-aggrandisement and honorifics, a vice which resulted in the absurd full name he assumed for himself in AD 191 of 'Lucius Aelius Aurelius Commodus Augustus Herculeus Romanus Exsuperatorius Amazonius Invictus Felix Pius'.
By the time this coin was likely minted, Commodus had at least lived up to 'Felix'. He had just overcome the coup of Perennis, the praetorian prefect, who wanted to install his own son on the throne, and also the rebellion in Gaul and Iberia led by the soldier Maternus, who in AD 187 planned to come to Rome and assassinate the emperor during the celebrations for the festival of the Hilaria, but who was betrayed just before the festival and beheaded.
Fleur De Coin. An apparently unique and unpublished variant of a type rated 'R2' by Calicó.
From the Altstetten Collection, kept in the vault of Crédit Suisse Geneva (documentation available upon request) since 26 November 1969.
In contrast to the internal turmoil centred on his court, Commodus' reign was mostly uneventful from the military point of view. Apart from a war in Dacia of which few details survive, the greatest contest Roman armies faced was in Britannia when in c. AD 181 the northern tribes breached Hadrian's Wall and, according to Cassius Dio "proceeded to do much mischief and cut down a general together with his troops" (LXII.8). The identity of this individual is uncertain, but it may well have been the provincial governor Caerellius Priscus, indicating a serious state of affairs indeed. Alarmed, Commodus dispatched a previous governor, Ulpius Marcellus to counter the invasion. Marcellus prosecuted the campaign with punitive raids north of the border, possibly even as far as the southern highlands, before ultimately withdrawing back to Hadrian's Wall. By 184 the situation in Britannia was stabilised and victory was declared; Commodus took the title 'Britannicus', and this became a feature of his coinage, recurring again and again in the legends on the obverses of his coins, such as the present (BRIT). As a result of the success of this campaign, and possibly his victories over the Sarmatians, Commodus also took the title 'Felix' (blessed) in this year as we see in the abbreviation FEL in the present coin.
The year before, Commodus had engaged in some similar titular propaganda, when he added the name Pius to his list of official titles (P), an adoption which 'looks like a direct appeal to the memory of the beloved Antoninus: Commodus insists that he is the true heir - perhaps also that the impiety of the family quarrel is entirely on the other side' (RIC III p.358). These additions demonstrate the taste that Commodus had for self-aggrandisement and honorifics, a vice which resulted in the absurd full name he assumed for himself in AD 191 of 'Lucius Aelius Aurelius Commodus Augustus Herculeus Romanus Exsuperatorius Amazonius Invictus Felix Pius'.
By the time this coin was likely minted, Commodus had at least lived up to 'Felix'. He had just overcome the coup of Perennis, the praetorian prefect, who wanted to install his own son on the throne, and also the rebellion in Gaul and Iberia led by the soldier Maternus, who in AD 187 planned to come to Rome and assassinate the emperor during the celebrations for the festival of the Hilaria, but who was betrayed just before the festival and beheaded.