The George W. La Borde Collection of Roman Aurei Part I
THE ROMAN EMPIRE
Caracalla, 198 – 217
Aureus Laodicea ad Mare 198, AV 7.16 g. IMP CAE M· – AVR ANT AVG Laureate bust r., wearing cuirass decorated with aegis. Rev. SPES PV – BLICA Spes advancing l., holding flower and raising skirt. C 598 var. (different bust and legend). BMC 646 and pl. 43, 18 (these dies). RIC 333. de Sartiges 269 (this coin). Mazzini dopo 598 (this coin). Biaggi 1220 (this coin). Calicó 2821 (these dies).
Very rare. An interesting and unusual portrait well struck in high relief,
virtually as struck and almost Fdc
Provenance
Found in 1901 in Karnak (Egypt)
Viscount Louis de Sartiges (1859-1924) Collection sold by Ars Classica, Lucien Naville expert, auction XVIII (”Un diplomate étranger”), Lucerne, 10 October 1938, lot 346, estimated CHF 450.
Giuseppe Mazzini (1883-1961) Collection.
Leo Biaggi de Blasys, (1906-1979) Collection acquired privately in 1978 by Bank Leu and a partner.
Sold by Numismatica Ars Classica, Zurich, auction 49, 21 October 2008, lot 321.

It was a special honour for a subsidiary imperial mint to strike in gold, and this remarkable aureus of Caracalla was struck at the branch mint of Laodicea in Syria, where the imperial family had resided during war against Pescennius Niger in A.D. 193-194. At the time this coin was struck in A.D. 198, Severus along with his family was again in the East, having just waged a successful war against the Parthians in retaliation for their invasion of Roman territory while he was in Gaul eliminating his final adversary, Clodius Albinus. He sacked the city of Ctesiphon, and after enslaving the population and carrying off much booty – which it should be noted is the likely source of the gold that was used to strike this coin – he took the title Parthicus Maximus. He also elevated the positions of both his sons: Caracalla, his eldest son, was promoted from the rank of caesar to augustus, and Geta, his youngest son, was given the title of caesar.
The obverse of this aureus, which belongs to one of the first issues struck for Caracalla as emperor, shows the youthful emperor wearing a cuirass or breastplate centrally embossed with the figure of a gorgoneion. The gorgoneion is often depicted as part of the aegis, a tasseled animal skin thought to be ageless and which extended an aura of immortality to the wearer. As part of the emperor’s armor its obvious purpose would have been to serve as a protective amulet during battle. The reverse depicts the goddess Spes, the personification of hope, and here expresses the stability that the Severan dynasty represents for an empire having just suffered several years of civil war.
In Antioch on January 1, A.D. 202, Severus and Caracalla jointly assumed the consulship, and soon thereafter returned to Rome, taking the overland route the entire journey. The family’s reception once back in the capital was attended with much fanfare. Rome had not only conquered its implacable enemy, Parthia, but Severus celebrated his decennalia with many festivities, including of course generous donatives to the people and the praetorian guardsmen, each of whom received ten gold aurei according to Dio Cassius.