Obverse: Head of Jupiter in laurel wreath, clockwise, behind her SC
Reverse: Victoria in quadriga to right holding reins, palm branch and laurel wreath, in section Q ATO BA B P R
Silver, diameter 18.0 mm, weight 3.79 g.
Provenance: Sayles & Lavender, LLC: 2007
This particular coin published in: B. B. Awianowicz, "Coins of the Roman Republic. A Compendium," Torun [2010]: 55.
The offered denarius was minted during the period of the civil war between the Popes led by Gaius Marius the Younger, on the one hand, and Sulla, who was returning from the east after a victorious campaign against Mithridates VI (the so-called First War against Mithridates ended in 85 BC), and who had already landed in Brundyzium in 83 and was conquering more and more of Italy. The denarius of Quintus Antonius Balbus, praetor and propretor of Sardinia under the popular dispensation of Marius and Cynna, was minted in Rome, however, not as a regular coin minted by the monetary triumvirs, but as a special senatorial coin most likely intended as pay for soldiers fighting on the side of Marian. In 82, however, Sulla finally defeated the son of the famous commander Gaius Marius at the Battle of the Colian Gate, and Antony Balbus lost his post and was soon killed on the orders of Rome's new dictator.
Also noteworthy is the type of coin itself - serratus (from the Latin thing serra - saw) means a coin struck on a specially incised disc. The incisions were intended to prevent coin counterfeiting, but this procedure proved ineffective in the long run.
