NERO. Sesterce. (Ae. 26.66g/35mm). 65 AD Lugdunum. Obv: NERO CLAVD CAESAR AVG GER PM TR P IMP P P. Laureate bust right of Nero. Rev: FREEZE DAT POP. Nero seated on dais, officer in front offering congiarum to a citizen on the stairs with a child behind, in the background Minerva holding owl and spear next to Libertas holding Tesera. (RIC 434). Good Very Fine. Obverse retouched. Very rare specimen.
Suetonius recounts that "Nero was born in Anzio, nine months after the death of Tiberius, on the 18th of the Kalends of January at sunrise." The last emperor of the Julio-Claudia dynasty and one of the Roman emperors with the worst "press" in the entire history of the Empire. Persecutions of Christians, the burning of Rome in 64 AD, various murders, including that of his British brother or his mother Agrippina, are some of the accusations that history has traditionally thrown at him. Good cause of this fame comes from the writings of contemporary and / or later historians such as the aforementioned Suetonius, Tacitus or Dion Cassius who presented the emperor as a true tyrant. It should be noted that this traditional and simple interpretation has been and is currently being questioned, or at least there is a current that also presents us with another aspect of the figure of the emperor, that of a leader loved by the popular classes, concerned for culture, the arts or sporting events.
From a strictly economic or numismatic point of view, under the government of Nero an important monetary reform was carried out in 64 AD that had the objective of expanding the nominal supply of money to avoid the insolvency of the State. Basically, its reform focused on reducing the theoretical weight of both the aureus and the denarius, as well as the purity of the latter, and putting the subsidiary denominations in orichalcum into circulation. This last measure was abandoned a short time later since this type of coin was never accepted by the people, but the first two remained and survived through the years.
Regarding the style of the portraits coined in the different pieces, these evolve, in a clear process of artistic realism, from that of a young man, already obese, and laureate with a civic crown, to that of an adult with harsh features in recent years. of reign
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