was struck in accordance with a law of Clodius, for previously this coin brought from Illyria was treated as merchandize. It was stamped with a Victory and hence its name. The gold piece was struck sixty-two years after the silver on such a standard that a scruple was worth twenty sesterces, and this on the scale of the then value of the sesterce made 900 go to the pound. Afterwards it was enacted that 1040 should be coined from gold pounds, and gradually the emperors reduced the weight, most recently Nero reduced it to 45."
This statement of Pliny is supported in various details by several disjointed passages of Varro and Festus. Thus the former says that "the most ancient bronze which was cast was marked with an animal (pecore notatum)[1], and elsewhere he says that the ancient money has as its device either an ox, or a sheep, or a swine[2]," a statement repeated by Plutarch and other later writers. Festus (s. v. grave aes) says "aes grave was so called from its weight because ten asses, each a pound in weight, made a denarius, which was so named from the very number (i.e. deni). But in the Punic war, the Roman people being burdened with debt, made out of every as which weighed a pound (ex singulis assibus librariis) six asses, which were to have the same value as the former." We have also a statement in the fragment of Festus (4, p. 347, Müller) that afterwards the asses in the sestertius were increased (i.e. to 4 from 2-1/2), and that with the ancients the denarii were of ten asses, and were worth a decussis, and that the amount of bronze (in the denarius) was reckoned at XVI asses by the Lex Flaminia when the Roman people were put to straits by Hannibal[3]. Again, Festus says: "Asses of the weight of a sextans (two ounces) began to be in use from that time, when on account of the Second Punic war which was waged with Hannibal, the Senate decreed that out of the asses which were then libral (a pound in weight)). Popl. 11.]
- ↑ Varro, R. R. II. 1, 9.
- ↑ Varro ap. Non. p. 189 aut bovem aut ovem aut vervecem habet signum. Probably uerrem, not ueruecem, is the true reading, since Plutarch says that the coins were marked with an ox, a sheep or a swine ([Greek: boun epecharatton ê probaton ê hyn
- ↑ Festus fragm. p. 347 Müller s.v. Sextantari asses.
