Dis Auspibus – The Divine Heralds
Septimius Severus. AD 193-211. AV Aureus (20mm, 7.24 g, 12h). Rome mint. Struck AD 194. L SEPT SEV PE RT AVG IMP III, laureate head right / DIS • AVSPICIB T R P • II, COS • II • P P in exergue, Hercules, naked, on left, standing left, holding club set on ground in right hand, lion skin over left arm; on right, Bacchus (or Liber), wearing wreath, naked, standing fleft, holding oenochoe in right hand and vertical thyrsus in left; between them, a panther, standing left, head right. RIC IV 31; Calicó 2446; BMCRE 63 (same rev. die); Biaggi 1069 (same obv. die); Rauch 103, lot 415 (same dies). Underlying luster, tiny die flaw on reverse. EF.
The first Roman emperor from Africa, Septimius Severus was born in Leptis Magna, which is present day Al-Khums, Libya. Severus seized power after the death of Pertinax in AD 193. On 1 June AD 193 Didius Julianus was killed by a palace soldier. Severus fought against the rival emperor Pescennius Niger, who he defeated in AD 194 at the battle of Issus in Cilicia. The reverse of this coin depicts the gods Hercules and Bacchus, patron deities of his hometown. They are identified as “Dis Auspicibus,” the Divine Heralds, who, together figure in the rhetoric of conquest and power, mediating between the Olympian deities and humankind. Septimius Severus celebrates their intervention in his rise to the throne and the defeat of his rival claimants with this magnificent reverse type.
