Page:Origin of metallic currency and weight standards.djvu/393

Fig. 56. Romano-Campanian Coin.

Fig. 57. Victoriatus

should pass for ten pounds of bronze, the quinarius for five, and the sestertius for two and a half. Now the libral weight was reduced in the First Punic war, as the state could not stand the expenditure, and it was appointed that asses of the weight of a sextans (2 unciae) should be struck. Thus there was a gain of five-sixths, and the debt was cleared off. The type of that bronze coin was on the one side a double Janus, on the other a ship's beak, whilst on the triens and quadrans there was a ship. The quadrans was previously termed a teruncius from tres unciae (three ounces). Afterwards under the pressure of the Hannibalic wars in the dictatorship of Q. Fabius Maximus, asses the weight of an ounce were coined, and it was enacted that the denarius should be exchanged for sixteen asses, the quinarius for eight, the sestertius for four; thus the state gained one half. Nevertheless in the soldiers' pay the denarius was always given for ten asses. The types of the silver were bigae and quadrigae (two-horse and four-horse chariots), hence they were termed bigati and quadrigati^[1]. By and by in accordance with the Papirian law half-ounce asses were struck. Livius Drusus when tribune of the Plebs alloyed the silver with an eighth part of bronze. The Victoriatus

1. Before striking silver at Rome the Romans had struck silver coins with type of quadriga and ROMA in Campania. Hence it is that Pliny regarded these the quadrigati and bigati as the oldest issue instead of the coins with the Dioscuri (Fig. 54). The biga came next, after it the genuine Roman quadriga.