The Finest of Three Known

Sale: CNG 79, Lot: 1218. Estimate $2000.  Closing Date: Wednesday, 17 September 2008.  Sold For $2850. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

Carausius. Romano-British Emperor, AD 286-293. AR Denarius (4.70 g, 6h). Uncertain mint. Laureate, draped, and cuirassed bust right / Sol standing facing, head left, raising hand and holding globe; RSR. RIC V 570; Shiel 63 (same dies). Good VF, toned, minor porosity. Very rare. The finest example of only three known.

From the Gordon S. Parry Collection. Ex The New York Sale I (3 December 1998), lot 350.

RSR has traditionally been viewed as a mintmark, denoting either Rouen, Rotomagus, or a mint on the site of modern Richborough, where excavations have yielded the highest concentration of Carausius’ denarii at a single site. More recently, though, G. de la Bédoyère, ("Carausius and the Marks RSR and I.N.P.C.D.A.," NC 1998, pp. 79-88) has interpreted RSR as a quote from Virgil's Eclogues iv.6-7: Redeunt Saturnia Regna.