100 



EECEEATIYE SCIENCE. 



THE " CONSECEATIO " COINS OF THE EOMAN EMPEEOES 

 AND THEIE FAMILIES. 



IN TWO PAETS. — PAET 11. 



At tlie deatli of Vespasian, and tlie cere- 

 monials connected witli the declaration of his 

 apotheosis, a coin was struck by the senate, in 

 deference to the wishes of his son Titus, of 

 similar character to that issued on the death 

 of Augustus. The car and elephants are, 

 however, more richly executed ; the leaders 

 of the elephants are larger and more dis- 

 tinct, and the statue of the emperor bears 

 on its extended hand a small figure of Victory. 

 The inscription over the car is simply div. 



AVG. VESP., for DIVO AVGVSTO VESPASIANO. 



To the Divine Augustus Vespasianus. The 

 reverse of this coin has also the large S. C, 

 and the name and titles of Titus. It was 

 issued A.D. 180. 



Divine honours were conferred also upon 

 empresses, and the daughters of emperors ; 

 and similar coins to those above described 

 were issued in honour of such events. Among 

 these I have selected for my illustration one 

 struck by Domitian, at the consecration of 

 his niece Julia, the daughter of Titus. In 

 this, as in other examples of coins struck to 

 commemorate the " consecration" of females, 

 the inventors of the devices used in the Eo- 

 man mint displayed great ingenuity ; for while 

 they strictly preserved the character of the 

 car and statue first introduced into the Eo- 

 man coinage, from the Greco-Egyptian type 

 of the Alexandrian coin, above described, 

 they, at the same time, succeeded in making 

 them appropriate to a female consecration. 

 This they effected by substituting a car- 

 pentum, or covered car, for the war chariot, 

 or the thersa. A carpentum device was first 

 used on a coin struck in honour of Livia, 

 the wife of Augustus, during her lifetime. 

 The carpentum was, in the early days of 



Eome, a mere covered cart, such as was 

 used by country people, especially for fe- 

 males. It was generally drawn by mules, and, 

 like all other carriages (excepting the thersa 

 used for the statues of the gods, and the 

 triumphal car of victors), was strictly ex- 

 cluded from the streets of Eome during the 

 republic. After the establishment of the em- 

 pire, the privilege of using a carpentum in the 

 streets on public festivals was conceded to the 

 females of the imperial house, and also to 

 those of a few other distinguished families; 

 and its use thenceforward became a badge of 

 rank. It was in a carriage of this descrip- 

 tion that the statue of a deceased empress 

 was placed to be carried to the games of 

 the circus, instituted in honour of her con- 

 secration, and at once suggested to the 

 designers of the types for the coinage, the 

 idea of producing for the commemorative 

 coins of deceased empresses an analogous 

 device to that of the car with elephants. 

 The coin under description, struck by Do- 

 mitian to the memory of his niece, bears on 

 the obverse a rich carpentum, the carpentum 

 pompaiicum of state occasions, supposed to 

 contain the statue of the empress, though it 

 does not appear. On arriving at the circus 

 the statue was removed with great ceremony, 

 and frequently placed among the statues 

 of the gods, as a supposed witness of the 

 games established in honour of the deceased 

 personage which it represented. Among 

 the flatteries accorded to Julius Csesar, as 

 we are informed by Dion Cassius, it was 

 decreed by the senate that his iconic or 

 portrait statue, sculptured in ivory, should 

 accompany the images of the gods to the 

 circus in a sacred chariot, and should stand 



