Antoniniani of the Two Caesars

167, Lot: 173. Estimate $300. Sold for $561. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

Balbinus. AD 238. AR Antoninianus (21mm, 4.82 g). Rome mint. Radiate, draped, and cuirassed bust right / FIDES MVTVA AVGG, clasped hands. RIC IV 11; RSC 6. VF, toned, light surface granularity.

From the C. G. Collection. Ex Stack’s (7 November 1990), lot 462.

With the deaths of the Gordians in Carthage, the Roman Senate faced a difficult situation. A vengeful Maximinus was headed to Rome (for the first time in his reign), and there was no center of opposition to his onslaught. The desperate senators called upon two of their number, Balbinus and Pupienus, to become joint emperors in the face of the threat, with Balbinus to organize Rome, while Pupienus marched out to confront Maximinus. Whether the two inexperienced emperors could have successfully met the challenge would never be known, because Maximinus was assassinated by his own troops before Aquileia in early April. The victory of the two emperors would be short-lived; they fell to bickering, and on 29 April disgusted Praetorian Guards dragged them out of the palace and murdered them. Their replacement was the young Caesar, Gordian, nephew of Gordian II. In the space of a few short months the Roman Empire had been ruled by a barbarian giant, an elderly provincial governor and his headstrong son, two incompetent senators and a thirteen year old boy.