84, Lot: 131. Estimate $100. Sold for $185. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

JULIUS CAESAR. 48 BC. AR Denarius (19mm, 3.35 gm). Military mint travelling with Caesar in northern Greece. Diademed female head (Venus?) right, wearing oak-wreath; LII behind / Trophy composed of Gallic shield, Gallic helmet, and carnyx; axe surmounted by a dog's head in right field. Crawford 452/2; CRI 11; Sydenham 1009; RSC 18. Fine, minor porosity.

The LII behind the female head has long been recognized as representing Caesar's age and places this issue within the year 48 BC, perhaps shortly after Pharsalus. Caesar's fifty-second birthday was on 13 July 48 BC; the battle at Pharsalus, the final major conflict between the Caesarian and Pompeian forces occurred a short one month later. The attribution of the female head has been in dispute. Given Caesar's emphasis of his Gallic victories on the reverse (events which formed the launching pad for his fight with Pompey and the Senate), the figure is quite likely Venus, divine ancestress of the gens Julia,/i> and a subject not unemployed on Caesar's coinage.