Alexander the Great, the renowned King of Macedon, pushed the boundaries of exploration and ruled over one of the largest empires the world has ever seen.  From a young age, he was told of his divine right to conquer Persia and the world as the son of the sky and thunder God Zeus.

Continued military success and confirmation by the Oracle at Siwah led him to believe these myths. Alexander’s victories and the spoils of war made his kingdom’s economy indestructible and his reign was cemented in gold and silver.

Alexander was so popular that his image continued to appear on coins even after his death. On this solid silver coin, minted around 290 BC, he’s depicted as nothing less than a God with distinctive horns representing the king’s nature as a divine being.

The other side of the coin may appear familiar. A very similar depiction graces our money to this day: The majestic, seated Athena is said to be one of the inspirations for Britannia.

Over two thousand years later, Alexander the Great remains a symbol of victory and success.

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When the hedonistic emperor Nero was made an enemy of the state and ultimately forced to commit suicide, the revolt of the Jews was already in its second year. Uprisings were not uncommon during the reign of the notorious ruler. An entire province, Britannia, had almost been lost a mere decade earlier. Had it not been for the tenacious resistance of a massively outnumbered Roman force, Boudica’s revolt would have seen the end of the Romans in Britain.

The people of Judaea revolted in AD 66 – the culmination of years of Roman-Jewish animosity over occupation, religion and tax. Full scale rebellion spread like wildfire across the holy land. The general Vespasian was sent to quash the rebellion. Banished by Nero for the crime of falling asleep at one of the emperor’s tedious theatrical performances, he was called back to lead a campaign with the intention of crushing the revolt in Judaea. Vespasian’s military career was one of many successes, and he had led one the three legions during the invasion of Britain in AD 43.

The First Jewish Revolt saw Jewish Zealots expel Roman forces from Judea and the formation of a provisional Jewish government in Jerusalem. This regime issued coins which have become extremely collectable in recent years. Silver shekels, half shekels and bronze pieces of various denominations were struck promoting Jewish cultural iconography, with inscriptions in Palaeo-Hebrew.

During the power struggles which erupted after Nero’s death, Vespasian was still stationed in Judaea. His Galilee campaign was a success by all accounts; rebel strongholds fell time and time again. Nero’s demise saw three emperors vying for control in AD 68 and 69. Galba, the general stationed in Gaul, was the first. His mobilisation and march on Nero in Rome was the final nail in the coffin for the mad emperor’s regime. Galba’s short rule was followed by that of Otho, the wealthy wig-wearing patrician, who shortly fell to Vitellius, the glutton. By this time, Vespasian had been proclaimed emperor by his troops and, leaving his son Titus in Judaea, marched on Rome and, upon the death of the ever-unpopular Vitellius, Vespasian assumed the purple.

The general-turned-emperor had unfinished business which would surely harm his popularity. The Jewish revolt was still not yet over. Jerusalem, the capitol, was finally besieged by the Roman army under the control of Titus in April of AD 70. Sieges were an art of war to which the Romans were adept. After four months of struggle, the colossal city of Jerusalem, with its massive walls, fell. The great Temple of Herod (either accidentally of deliberately) was burned to the ground. This saw the end of the main rebel forces in Judaea, and thousands of Jews massacred or sold in to slavery.

This was exactly what Vespasian needed. He had been the architect of the four-year-long campaign, and his celebrated son had finished what he started. No time wasted issuing what was essentially a commemorative coin series, to celebrate the victorious Romans. It is likely some of these coins were issued from in the earliest months of his reign, suggesting that to the Romans, victory in Judaea was already assured. In any case, the most well-known of the ‘Judaea Capta’ coinage features a simple but resonating design.

A mourning female Jew (or perhaps a personification of the entire province of Judaea) sits in a state of mourning, beside a large Roman trophy. Beneath, the inscription JVDAEA, in Latin, leaves no doubt as to the meaning of the design – a subjugated province defeated by Rome and again subservient.

As Vespasian’s most significant military campaign, coins celebrating victory over the Jews were issued numerously during the reign of Vespasian. His son Titus, who had been awarded a military triumph in Rome following the victory, had coins struck in his name, in celebration. He would go on to be made sole emperor following his father’s death in AD 79, cementing the Flavian Dynasty in Roman history.

The end of October saw the release of our Winter Fixed Price List which has quite possibly been our best catalogue yet, in terms of variety and high-quality material. Most notably it features a superb 12 Ceasars set and the impressive Broadstairs Collection. As is typical in the current market, we could have sold some of the higher quality pieces four or five times over, such as the Slaney Collection James I Unite (#146), the 1648 Pontefract Shilling from the Farquar Collection (#174) and many others. This is particularly promising and should eliminate any doubts about a slow-down in the market – as always quality seems to be the most desirable factor, with new records being set regularly.

Saturday 2^nd November saw the final London Coin Fair of the year and what should have been a quiet show due to the rugby final (the less said about this the better) turned out to be a worthwhile and busy show. Our next fair will be the New York International Numismatic Convention, held at the Grand Hyatt Hotel, from the 16^th to the 19^th January.

One particular highlight from our latest catalogue is a high-grade Elizabeth I Ship Ryal, a highly sought after and appealing coin (#140). The Ryal has an anachronistic, mediaeval appearance about it – showing the queen in the style and pose of her Plantagenet forebears. Yet 250 years after the Battle of Sluys, the naval theme is strangely appropriate to the decade which saw the momentous events of the Spanish Armada. One of England’s most iconic gold coins and the single greatest numismatic rarity of the celebrated Elizabethan era. Only a few specimens were made, they are generally encountered in low grade, and this is certainly up there with the finest of the surviving pieces.

Interestingly high-grade ship ryals have increased in value greatly over the years; the following graph shows three similar high-grade examples selling over a 10 year period – 2005, 2010 and 2015. This seemingly makes our example exceptional value for money, at a figure quite below the 100K mark.

sEE THE COIN

Without a doubt, one of the most famous dates in British history, the 5th of November is celebrated every year and has been since the 17^th Century.  On the 4^th of November, in 1605, plotters (including the notorious Guy Fawkes), conspired to destroy the House of Lords and with it, King James I. The Gunpowder Treason Plot failed. Guy Fawkes was caught in the vaults beneath the House of Lords with 36 barrels of gunpowder. The conspirators were of course captured, tried and executed in the months following the event.

On the 5^th of November (the day after the plot was uncovered), church bells were rung across the country, and Parliament later enshrined this date in law as a public day of celebration. This remained until 1859. Today, fireworks and bonfires are still used to celebrate the day the plot was uncovered, as they were three centuries earlier.

Coin collectors need not look far for numismatic objects to mark this eventful year. Coins of James I can be obtained with relative ease, at all price points, depending on the condition of course. Dates written in Arabic Numerals have featured on English coins since the reign of King Edward VI (1547-1553), but by the reign of James I (1603-1625), few pieces actually included a date. For those seeking a coin bearing the date itself, silver sixpences bearing ‘1605’ on their reverses are scarce but can be acquired for around £150 in fair condition.

For coins which do not feature dates, we must look to the mint marks for clues as to their time of manufacture. Mint marks were utilised in English coins from the Medieval period onwards, for administrative purposes, denoting mints, and ascertaining dates. Using this method, we cannot pin undated coins down to the nearest year, but the nearest two years. In the ‘First Coinage’ of James I, the mint mark of a Lis ⚜ denotes the dates of 1604 to 1605.

In the ‘Second Coinage’ for a coin possibly dating to 1605, we must look for the Lis ⚜ again (1604-5), and the Rose ❀(1605-6). These mint marks appear again during the much later ‘Third Coinage’ of James I, and it is important not to confuse the two coinages. The yearly catalogue ‘Coins of England & the United Kingdom’ will demonstrate the three coinages and various bust types of James I, including mint marks.

If you have any questions regarding the coins from this period, please feel free to contact us by e-mail or phone. From all of us here at Baldwin’s, we hope you have a fantastic Bonfire Night.

Explore our stock of James I coins

One of the pleasures of numismatics lies in the romance of names, the more obscure, perhaps, the more enchanting. Mervyn Peake, himself could not have invented any more gorgeous and euphonious verbal arabesques than the names of the emperor Didius Julianus, his consort: Manlia Scantilla and their daughter, Didia Clara. These names are today familiar only to the coin collector in pursuit of rarities and to a few surviving ancient historians.

We are fortunate in having three more or less reliable commentaries on the fleeting reign of Julianus. There is an account in Greek by Cassius Dio, who was a consul in the reign of Severus Alexander (222-235). Unfortunately, however, the section of his vast history relating the events of this period survives only in fragments and a later abridgement. Herodian of Syria, writing also in Greek, probably in the reign of Philip the Arab (244-49), also witnessed the events of the reign as a boy, and his account survives intact.

However, the most coherent narrative is that preserved in Latin in the miscellaneous Scriptores Historia Augusta, compiled two centuries later, apparently in the reign of Theodosius I (379-95). This work is a peculiar compendium, claiming to be written by six different fictional historians and full of bogus inventions. However, in the case of this particular reign, it seems to preserve an early, first-hand source and gives details absent from the accounts of Cassius Dio and Herodian.

Julianus’s nine-week reign was brief but momentous. He came to prominence during the reign of Marcus Aurelius, entering public life early when he became a quaestor a year before the legal age. The Historia Augusta tells us that he was appointed to a consulship on the recommendation of the emperor when, as governor of Belgica, he repelled a surprise invasion by the Chauci, shrewdly expending auxiliary troops rather than risking his Roman soldiers. Pure luck, it seems, preserved him during the bloody tyranny of Commodus. He was accused of conspiracy; but for once Commodus chose not to believe the accuser, who was crucified for his pains.

After Commodus’s assassination at the end of 192, Julianus found favour with his successor, the popular reformer, Pertinax. The Historia Augusta records that, as Julianus was presenting Sextus Cornelius Repentinus to Pertinax on the occasion of the young man’s betrothal to his daughter, Didia Clara, the emperor declared ‘Honour my colleague and successor’ seeming to designate Julianus his heir.

On 28 March 193 the Praetorian Guards, angered by Pertinax’s attempts to end the license to plunder and terrorise which Commodus had allowed them, shamefully murdered him, after a reign of a mere three months.

According to Herodian, the soldiers, fearing the anger of the people, immediately barricaded themselves in their camp. But, after a couple of days, discovering ‘that all was quiet and no one was brave enough to prosecute them’ they issued an announcement from the top of the wall, promising to entrust the power to the highest bidder’.

The Prefect of Rome, Titus Flavius Claudius Sulpicianus, whose daughter was Pertinax’s widow, immediately offered them 20,000 sesterces each.

Herodian writes that Julianus received the news of the auction while he was in a drunken stupor at a feast. His wife and daughter and a number of clients persuaded him to get up quickly from his couch and run to the camp wall to find out what was happening. All the way there they advised him to seize possession of the empire while it lay abandoned, and by sparing no expense to outbid all possible rivals by the size of his bribe.

The Historia Augusta adds that he was accompanied by his son-in-law, Repentinus, whose father had been the commander of the Praetorians. Herodian paints a vivid picture of the Guards letting down a ladder so that Julianus could climb on to the wall to address them.

He warned them against choosing someone like Sulpicianus, who might decide to avenge Pertinax and then upped the bid to 25,000 sesterces. According to the Historia Augusta, he ‘wrote on tablets a statement that he would restore the good name of Commodus’, and ‘as a result, he was not only let in but was named emperor’. Herodian records that the soldiers gave him the cognomen Commodus, though this does not appear on his coins. Shrewdly, perhaps, he ‘pardoned’ his rival, Sulpicianus, though he replaced him as Prefect of Rome with Repentinus.

On her husband’s elevation, Manlia Scantilla was named ‘Augusta’, and since Julianus had no son and heir, his daughter was given the same title. This gesture towards female equality is unique in Roman history, though the ambitions of Repentinus were presumably the main motive in Clara’s elevation.

It will remain forever uncertain whether Julianus was, as Herodian says, ‘addicted to luxurious and indecent living’, or as the Historia Augusta has it, ‘so frugal that he shared out a sucking-pig over a three-day period, likewise, a hare, if anyone happened to send him one’.

The portraits on his coins give the impression of a man with patrician dignity, but lacking the charisma of an Aurelius or a Pertinax. Ambiguous also are the characters of his wife and daughter. Though Herodian implies that the women urged him on in his foolish bid for power, the Historia Augusta relates that they moved into the palace ‘nervously and unwillingly, as though they already foresaw imminent catastrophe.’

Scintilla’s image on coins varies markedly with the die-cutter, but the sestertius and denarius illustrated here give the impression of a sensible, intelligent woman. Did she and Clara perhaps shrug helplessly as they approached the palace, at this fine mess their husband and father had gotten them into? Or did they indeed, true to the instincts of their class, naïvely revel in the glamour of their elevation?

Any apprehension they may have felt was fully justified. Julianus’s sole support came from the Praetorians and, according to Herodian, he did not in reality, own enough private wealth to pay them what he had promised.

Moreover, the public treasury was virtually bankrupt following the excesses of Commodus, and the new emperor was forced immediately to decrease both the purity and the weight of the silver denarius. It is an indication of the underlying stability and efficiency of the Roman state, however, that, despite this political and financial turmoil, coins struck in Julianus’s name found their way in substantial quantities to every corner of the empire.

At the circus games, a large faction took to chanting the name of Pescennius Niger, an ex-consul and Governor of Syria, ‘who was said to be already emperor’. According to Herodian, hearing the news from Rome, Niger sought support among the legionary commanders and military tribunes.

Popular because of his benign administration, and his sponsorship of frequent circus shows, he was readily proclaimed emperor in his own province. But, according to Herodian, instead of marching on Rome, ‘he turned to a life of idle luxury and enjoyment with the people of Antioch, devoting his attention to festivals and spectacles.’ Julianus sent out a former chief centurion with instructions to murder him.

But Julianus’ nemesis was to come from a different quarter. The governor of Pannonia, Septimius Severus, had a dream in which the emperor Pertinax rode on a fine horse down the Via Sacra in Rome. When he reached the entrance to the Forum he was thrown off, and the horse inserted itself under Severus instead. (It was Severus’s later appreciation of a short book by Cassius Dio on his prophetic dreams that launched the historian on his literary career.) Like Niger, Severus had little difficulty in gaining the acclaim of the officials and troops of his province.

But unlike Niger he then acted decisively, adopting the name Pertinax, and marching on Rome at speed. The desperate emperor sent Aquilius, ‘a centurion well known for murders of senators’, to kill him, and also prevailed upon the Senate to have him declared a public enemy. But, in no time, soldiers loyal to Severus had infiltrated the city in plain clothes, and Julianus’s cause was lost.

There was little he could do. Whatever funds he could gather from his dwindling circle of friends and supporters he gave to the Praetorian Guards. But, Herodian relates, since he had not paid them everything he had promised earlier, they merely took the money as their due. In despair, Julianus made no attempt to guard the Alpine passes, as his advisers told him he must. Instead, he collected together all the elephants in Rome, hoping to intimidate Severus’s naïve provincial troops. According to the Historia, he also ‘had the insane idea of performing a great many acts through magicians’.

Severus seized the fleet at Ravenna and those envoys of the Senate who were in his camp at the time prudently defected. Julianus resorted to diplomacy, sending out ‘the Vestal Virgins and the other priests, together with the Senate, to meet Severus’s army to entreat them with outstretched fillets.’ He proposed a division of power; he pleaded to be allowed to abdicate. But in vain.

The Senate submitted to Severus and sent a military tribune, in Herodian’s words, ‘to kill the cowardly, wretched, old man who had purchased this sorry end with his own money.’ The Historia Augusta is less moralistic:

In a short time, indeed, Julianus was deserted by everyone and remained in the palace with […] his son-in-law Repentinus. Finally, it was proposed that Julianus’s imperial power should be revoked; and revoked it was, and Severus was at once named emperor, while it was pretended that Julianus had taken his own life by poison. Nevertheless, some people were sent from the Senate, by whose efforts he was killed in the palace by a common soldier, imploring the protection of Caesar, that is, of Severus.

Cassius Dio claims that Julianus’s last pathetic words were: ‘But what evil have I done? Whom have I killed?’ The Historia Augusta makes one last mention of his family: He had emancipated his daughter when he gained the empire, and she had been given her inheritance; and this was at once taken from her, as well as the name Augusta. His body was given back by Severus to his wife Manlia Scantilla and his daughter and was moved to the tomb of his great-grandfather at the fifth milestone on the Via Labicana.

According to the Historia, he had lived ‘fifty-six years and four months, and reigned for two months and five days’. Cassius Dio gives slightly different figures.

Repentinus was either killed in the palace along with Julianus or was tidied away subsequently by murder. Sulpicianus was executed four years later, in 197, for plotting against Severus. Were Manlia Scantilla and Didia Clara perhaps, spared to live out a sad old age on an estate in the Campania? We are not told.

This article by James Booth is an excerpt from the Fixed Price List: Summer 2019.