Antoninus Pius Silver Denarius RIC III Antoninus Pius 381Ba

Monetary Context and Consecration Issues

During the mid-second century AD, the silver denarius was the foundational silver denomination of the Roman Empire, functioning alongside the gold aureus and base-metal aes denominations to facilitate military expenditure, administrative salaries, and urban commerce. Under Antoninus Pius, who ruled from AD 138 to AD 161, imperial fiscal administration enjoyed a period of relative peace and monetary stability. The denarius maintained a steady weight standard generally centering between 3.15 and 3.40 grams, with a silver fineness hovering around 75 to 80 percent, continuing the metallurgical baseline established under Trajan and Hadrian. When Annia Galeria Faustina, known to history as Faustina the Elder, died in late AD 140 or early AD 141, the Senate consecrated her as Diva Faustina at the emperor's request. To institutionalize her divine cult and project the emperor's pietas, the imperial mint initiated one of the most prolific and prolonged commemorative coinages in Roman history. Denarius type RIC III Antoninus Pius 381Ba belongs to the inaugural phase of this vast monetary program in AD 141. While many consecration denarii focused on afterlife symbols such as altars, eagles, or peacocks, this type emphasized personal and dynastic devotion by pairing the newly deified Augusta directly with her surviving consort, thereby embedding family solidarity into daily economic transactions.

Production and Mint Organization

All specimens of RIC III Antoninus Pius 381Ba were struck exclusively at the central imperial mint in Rome. During this era, the Rome mint operated with a sophisticated organizational division into multiple officinae, or workshops, capable of engraving hundreds of obverse and reverse dies simultaneously to sustain massive production outputs across denominations. The flans for this silver denarius were cast in open moulds before being manually hammer-struck between hand-carved bronze or iron dies. Die alignment for the Antonine mint was typically adjusted to a vertical axis, showing a predominantly regular six o'clock or twelve o'clock orientation. The engraving of the dies reflects the peak of Antonine classicism, characterized by balanced modeling, careful proportion, and meticulous execution of complex textile folds and elaborate hairstyles. Die studies of the Diva Faustina series have revealed that obverse dies for early deification denarii often show subtle stylistic shifts, indicating that multiple engravers worked concurrently to satisfy the immense production demands of the consecration emission.

Obverse Iconography and Hair Typology

The obverse of RIC III Antoninus Pius 381Ba features the draped bust of Faustina the Elder facing right. Unlike later posthumous issues where Faustina is often portrayed veiled or with a stephane, this initial issue portrays her bareheaded, highlighting her celebrated personal coiffure. The hair is parted, delicately waved across the temples in several horizontal bands or loops, and drawn upward from the nape of the neck to form a high, coiled braided crown on the apex of the head. In Martin Beckmann's comprehensive typological analysis of the Diva Faustina coinage, this distinctive hairstyle is identified as the classic lifetime and immediate post-mortem arrangement (Hair Type b), which had become an empire-wide fashion icon for Roman aristocratic women. The portrait emphasizes aristocratic dignity, timeless maturity, and divine serenity without displaying excessive age, serving as an idealized portrait of the empress transitioning into celestial majesty. The truncation of the bust is neatly draped, with the fabric folds rendered in soft, naturalistic lines characteristic of the finest Antonine die-engraving workshops in Rome.

Reverse Iconography: The Dextrarum Iunctio

The reverse of RIC III Antoninus Pius 381Ba features a complex figurative tableau depicting Antoninus Pius and Diva Faustina standing face-to-face. Antoninus stands on the left, togate, facing toward the right; his left hand holds a ceremonial volumen, or scroll, representing his civic, religious, and legal duties as princeps and pontifex maximus. On the right, Faustina stands facing left, draped in stola and palla, with her head veiled to denote her divine and consecrated status. Her left hand supports a tall, vertical sceptre, a traditional attribute of imperial sovereignty and divine majesty associated with Juno. The focal point of the composition is the clasping of their right hands, an ancient Roman ritual motif known as dextrarum iunctio. Originally an integral element of the Roman nuptial rite symbolizing marital fidelity, unity, and mutual concord, the gesture acquired profound political overtones on imperial coinage. Here, it signifies the eternal union between the living princeps on earth and his deified consort in heaven. By portraying Faustina holding a sceptre alongside Antoninus holding his roll, the iconography confirms her active transcendent status as a divine patroness and protectress of her husband's administration.

Epigraphic Form and Legend Analysis

The legends on RIC III Antoninus Pius 381Ba are concise, elegant, and loaded with religious and civic significance. The obverse legend reads DIVA AVG FAVSTINA, running clockwise along the border. The initial title DIVA explicitly declares her apotheosis, officially voted by the Roman Senate and sanctioned by the princeps. AVG abbreviates AVGVSTA, the imperial title bestowed upon her at Antoninus's accession in AD 138, while FAVSTINA serves as her cognomen. Unlike later extensive issues that reduced the obverse legend simply to DIVA FAVSTINA, the inclusion of AVG marks this type as part of the early, formative deification series struck immediately after her death. The reverse inscription consists solely of the single word CONCORDIAE, struck horizontally or curvilinearly in association with the central figures. Grammatically, CONCORDIAE functions as a dative of dedication, translating as 'To Concord' or 'To Harmony', thereby offering the image as an act of veneration to the personified virtue. Alternatively, it can be interpreted as an objective genitive ('Of Concord'). This dedication encapsulates both domestic marital affection and the wider harmony binding the imperial house with the Roman populace, senate, and gods, reassuring the empire of political tranquility through divine favor.

Typology and Chronological Classification

In the standard classification established in The Roman Imperial Coinage (RIC), volume III, Harold Mattingly designated this reverse motif under catalog number 381. The subtype 381Ba is specifically distinguished by the exact combination of obverse legend DIVA AVG FAVSTINA with a bareheaded, draped bust right, paired with the CONCORDIAE legend and the dextrarum iunctio reverse composition without additional subsidiary symbols in the field. Paul Strack and Martin Beckmann established that Diva Faustina's coinage unfolded in distinct chronological phases. The first phase, struck in AD 141, employed the obverse legend DIVA AVG FAVSTINA alongside motifs addressing her funeral, consecration, and personal relationship with Antoninus. Subsequent phases, produced later in the 140s and extending through the 150s AD, adopted the shorter obverse legend DIVA FAVSTINA and shifted reverse themes toward temple architecture, eternity (AETERNITAS), and specific Olympian deities. Type 381Ba is thus securely anchored to the very beginning of the series in AD 141, making it a critical chronological benchmark for the transition from the lifetime issues of Faustina to the prolonged posthumous cult series.

Circulation, Hoard Evidence, and Longevity

As standard silver denarii of high quality, specimens of RIC III Antoninus Pius 381Ba circulated widely throughout the provinces and frontiers of the Roman Empire. Hoard evidence from Roman Britain, Gaul, the Rhine-Danube limes, and the Mediterranean basin confirms that Antonine denarii remained in active commercial use for generations. Due to the gradual debasement of the denarius under Septimius Severus and Caracalla in the late second and early third centuries AD, second-century denarii struck under Antoninus Pius retained substantial intrinsic value and were favored for hoarding. Coins of this specific type are well attested in both domestic civilian contexts and military camp hoards. Many recovered examples exhibit moderate to heavy surface wear, testifying to decades of circulation before their final deposition during periods of political turmoil in the third century AD. The longevity of the type in daily exchange ensured that the visual message of the dextrarum iunctio between Antoninus and the deified Faustina remained a familiar emblem of Antonine peace and marital concord long after the original historical actors had passed away.

References

1. Diva Faustina: Coinage and Cult in Rome and the Provinces. pp. 23-45
2. RIC III Antoninus Pius 381Ba. ric.3.ant.381Ba
3. The Roman Imperial Coinage, Vol. III: Antoninus Pius to Commodus. p. 72, no. 381Ba
4. Untersuchungen zur römischen Reichsprägung des zweiten Jahrhunderts, Teil III: Die Reichsprägung zur Zeit des Antoninus Pius. pp. 88-92