Well Struck Vitellius

389, Lot: 600. Estimate $500. Sold for $1100. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

Vitellius. AD 69. AR Denarius (18.5mm, 3.14 g, 6h). Rome mint. Struck circa late April-20 December. Laureate head right / Libertas standing facing, head right, holding pileus and vindicta. RIC I 105; RSC 47. Good VF, toned, shallow scratches.

From the KD Collection. Ex Lanz 156 (2 June 2013), lot 280.

According to A Dictionary of Ancient Roman Coins by John Melville Jones, “Libertas”, the vindicta, which Libertas carries, was “the rod with which a slave was touched during the ceremony of manumission or liberation.”