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Rare and Important Vespasian Gold Aureus
1213
Vespasian. Gold Aureus (7.28 g), AD 69-79. Rome. IMP CAESAR VESPASIANVS AVG, laureate head of
Vespasian right. Rev. COS VII, bull standing right. (RIC 840; BN -; BMC 176; Calicó 622). Well struck with
underlying luster present. Extremely fine.
$ 15,000
Purchased privately from Tom Cederlind.
The reverse of this aureus resurrects a type from the numismatic iconography of Augustus as a means of linking Vespasian’s Flavian
dynasty, which owed its imperial power to victory in civil war, to the glorious reign of the first Roman emperor. In this way the
undisputed legitimacy of Augustus was made to rub off on the militaristic Flavian dynasty. In its original Augustan context, the bull
type represented one of several bovine statues by the Archaic Greek sculptor Myron carried off from Athens to Rome by Augustus
in 28 BC. These were subsequently erected before the Temple of Apollo on the Palatine.
Outstanding Denarius of Vespasian with his Sons
1214
Vespasian, with Titus and Domitian, as Caesars. Silver Denarius (3.29 g), AD 69-79. Ephesus. IMP CAESAR
VESPAS AVG COS III TR P P P, laureate head of Vespasian right. Rev. AVG VESPAS above, LIBERI IMP
below, bare heads of Titus, on left, and Domitian, on right, confronted; between, E(PHE). (RIC 1429; RPC
831; BN 347; BMC 455; RSC 2a). Attractive antique tone. Superb extremely fine.
$ 7,500
ex Gorny & Mosch 133 (11 October 2004), lot 434.
ex Heritage / Gemini VIII (14 April 2011), lot 301
ex Goldberg 70 (4 September 2012), lot 3238
ex Manhattan Sale IV (8 January 2013), lot 156
The portraits of Vespasian and his designated successors, his sons Titus and Domitian, here serve to draw attention to Vespasian’s
founding a new dynasty and were meant to reassure the populace that there was a plan for an orderly succession in the Flavian house,
an important message after the upheaval of the recent civil war (AD 69). The value of this sort of reassuring dynastic typology may
be gauged by Septimius Severus’ reuse and adaptation of it for some of his coinages struck in the aftermath of the civil wars of AD
193-197.