Ancient Coin of the Day: As it's First Constitutional Settlement day, it would be rude if today's coin weren't Augustan, so let's kick off with a denarius of 19-18 BC from Caesaraugusta. #ACOTD #Augustus

Image: RIC Augustus 42B; ANS 1944.100.39039. Link - http://numismatics.org/ocre/id/ric.1(2).aug.42B

As a part of the various honours awarded to Augustus in January 27 BC - in addition to the very title 'Augustus' - one of the signifiers of the supremacy and uniqueness of his position was the awarding of the 'clipeus virtutis', or 'Shield of Virtue'. This was a golden shield...

...set up in the Julian Senate-house "with an inscription that the Senate and the Roman People gave it to me because of my courage, clemency, justice and piety" (Res Gestae 34.2).

It is this shield that forms the focus of the decoration on the Reverse of this coin, with the Legend S P Q R CL V emblazoned upon it - 'The Senate and People of Rome [dedicated] the Shield of Virtue'.

It is telling that in other numismatic issues, the Shield was associate with key accomplishments of Augustus, as on this aureus from Colonia Patricia of 19BC, where it is linked with the recovery of the Parthian standards.

Image: RIC Augustus 85A. Link - http://numismatics.org/ocre/id/ric.1(2).aug.85A

The recovery of these Roman standards from the Parthians, which had been captured from Crassus at Carrhae on 9 June 53 BC, was a major propaganda coup for Augustus. https://twitter.com/DocCrom/status/1336667130167701505?s=20

Similarly, on this denarius of Colonia Patricia - also from 19 BC - we see the Shield associated with the 'corona civica', awarded to Augustus in 27 BC for 'saving the lives of citizens'.

Image: RIC Augustus 79A; ANS 1944.100.39057. Link - http://numismatics.org/ocre/id/ric.1(2).aug.79A

The oak wreath too was a significant element of the Augustan numismatic issues, employed to be symbolic of the benefits of his influence over the Roman state. https://twitter.com/DocCrom/status/1349313146108960770?s=20

The overall effect of this numismatic propensity of representations of the qualities and characteristics of the new emperor was surely designed to craft an image of the ideal nature of his rulership.

For more, see:

Wallace-Hadrill, Andrew. “The Emperor and His Virtues.” Historia: Zeitschrift Für Alte Geschichte, vol. 30, no. 3, 1981, pp. 298–323.

http://www.jstor.org/stable/4435768 

#ACOTD #Augustus