Philip the Arab Silver Antoninianus, RIC IV Philip I 19

Monetary and Historical Context

The issue designated as RIC IV Philip I 19 belongs directly to the lavish ceremonial celebration staged in AD 248 for Rome's millennium. Historical tradition held that Romulus had founded the city in 753 BC, establishing AD 248 as the year of Rome's thousandth birthday. Philip the Arab utilized this historic milestone to bolster his dynastic legitimacy amidst severe political volatility and ongoing barbarian incursions across the Danube frontier. The celebrations included the Ludi Saeculares, which drew on monumental displays, theatrical entertainments, and amphitheater hunts showcasing exotic wild beasts. Economically, the Roman imperial coinage of the late 240s AD relied almost entirely on the radiate billon denomination, commonly termed the antoninianus, which had superseded the traditional denarius as the primary silver currency unit. The nominal tariff of the antoninianus stood at two denarii, despite containing substantially less than twice the intrinsic silver content of contemporaneous denarii. By AD 248, the metallic alloy had degraded to a debased billon standard, frequently falling to between 40 and 45 percent silver, with base copper making up the majority of the alloy. The emission of RIC IV Philip I 19 supplied substantial ceremonial largesse to the Roman populace and legions, fusing practical monetary distribution with calculated imperial propaganda of a renewed golden age.

Production and Mints

The entire Secular Games commemorative radiate series, including RIC IV Philip I 19, was produced exclusively at the primary imperial mint in Rome. During Philip's reign, the Rome mint was systematically organized into six individual workshops, designated in Latin as officinae. To maintain strict administrative oversight and quota tracking across the massive special coinage of AD 248, mint authorities implemented explicit workshop control marks on the reverse dies. Individual workshops were assigned specific animal motifs and distinct numerals placed in the lower field or exergue. The fifth officina, denoted either by the Roman numeral V or its Latin vocalic equivalent U, was entrusted with the striking of Philip I antoniniani displaying the walking stag. Blank preparation involved casting flans from molten billon, which were subsequently blanched or pickling-treated in dilute acidic solutions to dissolve surface copper and impart an enriched silver-white finish upon striking. Average weight standards for these antoniniani typically clustered between 3.6 and 4.2 grams with typical module diameters spanning 21 to 23 millimeters, though individual flans varied widely due to rapid, al marco striking procedures common in mid-third-century minting practice.

Obverse Iconography and Variations

The obverse of RIC IV Philip I 19 displays a right-facing bust of Philip the Arab. The emperor is portrayed wearing the radiate crown, the signature visual convention used to distinguish the double denarius denomination from the laureate denarius since its introduction under Caracalla in AD 215. The portraiture is rendered in the characteristic realistic style of the soldier-emperor period, featuring a short, closely cropped military beard, broad facial contours, and a furrowed brow intended to convey stern vigilance and gravitas. The imperial bust is shown draped and cuirassed, visible at the shoulder and base of the neck, symbolizing both supreme civic authority and active military command. Minor die-engraving variations exist across the series, primarily concerning the exact disposition of the drapery folds over the cuirass plate, the angle of the radiate spikes, and the truncation line of the bust, reflecting the hands of multiple celatores working concurrently within the fifth officina.

Reverse Iconography and Design Motifs

The reverse of RIC IV Philip I 19 depicts a stag with prominent antlers, stepping deliberately towards the right. Some older numismatic descriptions intermittently labeled this creature an elk or moose due to varying antler renderings on individual dies, but historical and zoological consensus generally identifies the animal as a red deer or stag imported for the millennial amphitheater venationes. The animal represents one of several captive wild creatures featured on the Secular Games series, contrasting with the lion of officina I, the she-wolf and twins of officina II, the gazelle of officina III, the hippopotamus of officina IV, and the antelope of officina VI. The stag walks atop a ground line, below which the exergue displays the control mark U (or V), identifying the fifth workshop. The visual imagery celebrated imperial mastery over the natural world and the munificence of the emperor in providing magnificent public games for the citizenry of Rome.

Inscriptions and Epigraphy

The legends on RIC IV Philip I 19 are rendered in neat Latin capital epigraphy typical of mid-third-century Rome. The obverse legend reads IMP PHILIPPVS AVG, expanding to Imperator Philippus Augustus. This concise titulature proclaims Philip's supreme military imperium and his imperial majesty, omitting detailed tribunician dates or consulships to maintain visual clarity and accommodate the prominent radiate portrait. The reverse legend reads SAECVLARES AVGG, which stands for Saeculares Augustorum. The double 'G' at the conclusion of AVGG is an explicit grammatical marker of the joint Augusti, referring to the shared imperial status of Philip I and his young son, Philip II, who had been elevated to co-emperor in AD 247. The inscription translates broadly to 'The Centennial Games of the Emperors', linking the imperial dynasty directly to the monumental transition into Rome's new age. In the exergue beneath the stag, the single letter U serves as the workshop numeral five, adopting the archaic Latin convention where the vowel U substituted for the numeral V.

Typology and Chronology

Within the standardized typology established by the Roman Imperial Coinage corpus, type RIC IV Philip I 19 is restricted chronologically to the millennial jubilee year of AD 248. The issue constitutes an integral component of the coordinated SAECVLARES emission struck across all six officinae. Parallel antoninianus types were struck simultaneously for Empress Otacilia Severa (featuring the hippopotamus marked with officina IIII) and the junior Augustus Philip II (featuring an elk, gazelle, or captive goat with officina VI). RIC IV Philip I 19 is distinct from neighboring Philip I types in the series, such as RIC 12 (lion, officina I), RIC 15 (wolf and twins, officina II), and RIC 24 (column or cippus inscribed for the games). While some dies exhibit slight stylistic variations in the posture of the stag or the precise spacing of the letters, the combination of the IMP PHILIPPVS AVG obverse, the SAECVLARES AVGG stag reverse, and the officina mark U/V securely isolates this exact catalog type within the 248 AD chronological horizon.

Circulation, Hoards, and Archaeological Evidence

Coins of RIC IV Philip I 19 circulated broadly across the Roman world during the mid-third century. As a result of the substantial volume struck for the millennium distributions, these stags were distributed not only within Italy but were rapidly carried to military garrisons stationed along the Rhine and Danube frontiers, as well as into Gaul and Britain. Because the silver standard of Roman billon deteriorated precipitously in the 250s and 260s AD under Valerian and Gallienus, coins of Philip I preserved a comparatively higher intrinsic silver content than subsequent issues. Consequently, antoniniani of the SAECVLARES series were frequently hoarded during the monetary instability of the late third century. Significant numbers of RIC IV Philip I 19 specimens have been documented in vast savings deposits, including the Cunetio hoard and the Dorchester hoard in Britain, as well as multiple continental European hoards buried during the crises of the mid-260s and 270s AD.

References

1. Coin Hoards and Hoarding in the Roman Empire. pp. 145-182
2. Coinage in the Roman World. pp. 110-125
3. The Monumental Coinage of the Roman Empire: A Study of the Coinage of Philip the Arab. pp. 88-104
4. Online Coins of the Roman Empire: RIC IV Philip I 19. ric.4.ph_i.19
5. The Roman Imperial Coinage, Volume IV, Part III: Gordian III - Uranius Antoninus. p. 70, no. 19