LOT 2862

Domitian AE As. AD 81-96.

Rome mint; struck AD 87. [IMP CAES DOMIT AVG GERM COS XIII] CENS PER P P, laureate head to right / [VIRTVTI] AVGVSTI, Virtus standing to right, foot on helmet, holding spear and parazonium; S C across fields. RIC II.1 550; BMCRE 404. Fine. Edges having been tapped to create raised rims.(10.04gr, 28mm, 6h.).

Property of a Cambridgeshire, UK, gentleman.

Proto-contorniate is the modern term used to describe Roman Imperial and Provincial bronze coins of the first, second, and early third centuries with hammered-up edges. These raised edges on the rims probably occurred after these bronze issues no longer circulated and ceased to be part of the currency in general use. A common assumption is that proto-contorniates functioned as game counters since the rim created through hammering could protect the designs. Andreas Alföldi in Die Kontorniaten (Budapest, 1943) believed proto-contorniates to be forerunners of the contorniates of the fourth and fifth centuries. He argued that proto-contorniates were New Year's gifts and that the older coins were actually hammered in the fourth century before the contorniates proper came into being.