Folia archeologica 28.
Katalin Bíro-Sey: Római pénzek egykorú hamisítványai a Niklovits gyűjteményből
94 К. BÍRÓ-SEY reign of Nero onwards. What may be the reason for the fact that while Augustean coins with find places occur so rarely to-day, we have a relatively great number of their fakes ? The coins of the emperors after Nero found often in hoards as well as in stray finds, are quite common, whereas we rarely come across their counterfeits until the end of the 3rd century. The next counterfeit coin was struck after the denarius of Julia Maesa (Cat. No. 8). Both the representation and the legend of the obverse, following type Cohen 20, are faultless; the representation of Juno on the reverse is, though, barbarizing, the legend, as far as it is conserved: PV. . .PI — quite senseless and cannot be connected with any of the intellegible legends belonging to the Juno representations. The original of this Julia Maesa denarius was struck between 218 and 222. There is a hybrid copy of a denarius (Cat. No. 9), whose obverse follows that of Severus Alexander (Cohen 239), the reverse had been, though, made after the denarius of Elagabal with a seated Roma and the legend PM TRP II-COS II PP (cf. Coh. 136), but both legend and representation are reversed in relation to the original. The legend is going from the right to the left, the seated Roma is looking right. We shall return to the producing of those inverted reverse when dealing with a counterfeit follis of Maximian Herculius (Cat. No. 10). Though the Elagabal reverse could be dated exactly by the number of the consulates to 219, the obverse of the hybrid denarius was made after a coin of Alexander Severus, struck, naturally, in later times. The copy could not have been struck prior to the reign of Alexander Severus, though we cannot fix its date. The copy made after the follis of Maximian Herculius (Cat. No. 10) has a quite unintellegible legend on its obverse; instead of the letter mainly lines and circles were used. According to the portrait however, it may be suggested that it was, copied from a mint of Maximian Herculius. The reverse bears the legend corrupted from SACRA MONET AVGG ET CAESS NOSTR. The image represents Moneta with scales and a cornucopia, standing to left. In the exergue a mintmark resembling COH appears. There are two peculiarities in connection with this coin; firstly that the mintmark COH, which is nearest to the mark CON, could not be copied from a genuine mark of the Constantinople mint, as there was, in this time, no Constantinople mint, nor a city with this name either. The mint office of Arelate used also the mark CON but only much later, after 328, when the city had been renamed Constantina after Constantine II. 6 Thus it is evident that this counterfeit follis could not have been made after an original with the mint mark CON. At the time when these marks occur, Maximian Herculius was not an emperor any longer, and no folles of this reverse were struck either. For Maximian Herculius coins with similar legends and design on the reverse were struck at Ticinum, 7 Aquileia, 8 and Siscia. 9 The other peculiarity of this specimen is that while on the original coins inscribed SACRA MONETA .... Moneta stands left, holding in her right scales and 6 The R Imperionaalm Coinage. (RIC) VII. 232. ? RIC VI. 270-271. 8 RIC VI. 315. 9 RIC VI. 469-470, 473.
