Description
Caesar Augustus, Roman Emperor of the Julio-Claudian Dynasty 27BC – 14 AD, Silver Denarius (3.71g, 18mm), Lugdunum mint 11-10 BC. Obverse: Laureate head of Augustus facing to the right, legend surrounds, “AVGVSTVS DIVI·F”. Reverse: Bull butting to the right, “IMP· XII” in exergue. Similar to Sear-1610; RIC.I-176a; RSC-153. Bankers mark to jaw and minor graffiti to lower right field on obverse, otherwise an attractive example with a fine portrait, good Very Fine / Very Fine.
Following his appointment as Propraetor and governor of Macedonia in 60 BC, the father of Augustus, Gaius Octavius, was sent by the Senate to quell a slave rebellion in the city-state of Thourioi. Many of these slaves had taken part in the rebellion led by Spartacus during the Third Servile War or followed Lucius Sergius Catilina, a Roman senator who had attempted to overthrow the Roman Republic. So important was his victory in Lucania, Gaius Octavius bestowed upon his young son the cognomen ‘Thurinus’ in recognition of the event, and would prove himself a capable leader and politician thereafter. He is remembered in an inscription by his son within the forum, detailing him as the “father of Augustus, twice military tribune, quaestor, aedile of the plebs together with Gaius Toranius, judge, praetor, proconsul, proclaimed imperator in the province of Macedonia”. Although Octavian, now Augustus, would remove the cognomen ‘Thurinus’ from his name early in his life in favour of the names of his adoptive father, Gaius Julius Caesar, the extensive ‘bull’ coinage series of both Aureii and Denarii became a subtle yet clear recalling to this familial connection and the deeds of Gaius Octavius. The series was struck at the Gallic mint of Lugdunum (modern day Lyon), much like that of Tiberius ‘Pontif Maxim’ series many years later, and were inspired near completely by the simple charging bull reverses of the coins of Thourioi, Lucania, which were struck in the late classical period circa 400-300 BC. Although Octavian would remove all naming of the gens Octavia, essentially ending his family line, and styling himself ‘Divi Ivlii filivs’, son of the divine Julius Caesar, after the deification of his adoptive father in 42 BC, it is interesting that the now first Emperor of Rome would not completely ignore his heritage.