The Roman Empire
Carinus, 283 – 285. Aureus, Siscia 284, AV 6.11 g.
Description: IMP C M AVR CARINVS P F AVG Laureate and cuirassed bust l. Rev. LIBERA – LITAS AVG Liberalitas standing l., holding tessera and cornucopia; in field r., star. References: C 48
RIC 309
Calicó 4347 (this coin)
Biaggi 1666 (this coin) Condition: Very rare and possibly the finest specimen known. A very attractive and unusual portrait, virtually as struck and almost Fdc Provenance: Glendining’s sale January 53, Rashleigh, 89
NAC sale 46, 2008, 673
NAC sale 59, 2011, 1146
Ira & Larry Goldberg sale 69, 2012, 3611
The Laughin collection
The Biaggi collection Note: Details of the short-lived dynasty of Carus and his two sons, Carinus and Numerian, are scanty and imprecise, and in many respects unreliable due to a tradition of hostility amongst later writers. We do know that both Carinus and his younger brother were grown adults when their father was elevated to the purple, and that both were made Caesars at the same time late in A.D. 282. However, Carinus held the senior position and early in A.D. 283 was elevated to the rank of Augustus, sharing the ordinary consulship with his father. He was then left to guard the western half of the Empire while his father and brother left for the East in order to engage the Parthians.
After successfully campaigning in Parthia, Carus died suddenly of illness. Numerian was immediately acclaimed Augustus by his troops and concluded his father’s Parthian campaign by turning the army around and heading back west. On the return journey he died under suspicious circumstances, and the commander of his personal bodyguard, Valerius Diocles, was acclaimed emperor.
Meanwhile in the West, Carinus was settling a disturbance that had developed in Roman Britain when news of Numerian’s death and Diocles’ subsequent elevation spread and revolt broke out. The insurrection was led by an official from northern Italy, the corrector Julian of Pannonia who had taken the title of Augustus, and Carinus marched south to confront the usurper. Early in A.D. 285 he quashed the revolt in battle either near Verona or in Illyria, and then proceeded to Moesia where he engaged the forces of Diocletian at the Battle of the Margus River. It is not known whether Carinus was defeated and slain in battle, which appears likely, or whether he was murdered by a jealous officer whose wife he had seduced, but he was killed at about this time leaving the Empire open to Diocletian.