Septimius Severus: The Original "Hammer of the Scots" - plus, a bargain rarity!

[CPK]

I don’t know who comes to your mind when you think of the quintessential Roman military Emperor, but for me, I think of this guy:

(Bust of Septimius Severus, photo from Wikipedia)

Through and through the military Emperor, Septimius Severus had no time for the niceties of the Augustan Principate. He seized the throne openly through military force in A.D. 193 (following the chaos after Commodus’s assassination) and held it for over 17 years.

If there’s one thing you can say about Septimius Severus, it’s that he didn’t believe in doing things by halves. Massive armies and brutal campaigns became characteristic of his military style, right from the very beginning. Severus showed little mercy to his enemies and did not allow for second chances.

A fascinating part of this history is Septimius Severus’s campaign in Caledonia - what is now northern England and Scotland.

Gnaeus Julius Agricola, an energetic and accomplished general, had conquered much of northern Britain and Scotland some one hundred twenty years previously, under the Flavians. But pressure from the native tribes and the logistical problems of maintaining a secure border so far from the epicenter of the Empire led to the gradual abandonment of these areas. Famously, the Emperor Hadrian (117 - 138) built a wall across the northern part of Britain, much of which still stands today, in order to provide added security and control over the region.

(Hadrian's Wall, image from Wikipedia)

Later, Hadrian’s successor Antoninus Pius (138 - 161) built a second wall, about 100 miles north of Hadrian’s:

(Image from Wikipedia)

By the time of Septimius Severus, the native Caledonians had pushed their way south past the Antonine Wall all the way to Hadrian’s Wall and beyond. Part of the problem lay in the fact that one of Septimius Severus’s rivals for the throne back in 193 had been the governor of Britain, a man named Clodius Albinus, and he had effectively stripped the province of soldiers to fight in the civil wars, leaving the frontier very thinly defended.

In 208 Severus intended to put a stop to the raids and incursions. He travelled north with a huge army, numbered at 40,000 men, and accompanied by his sons Antonius “Caracalla” and Geta.

First things first. Upon arrival at Hadrian’s Wall, Severus and his army stopped to strengthen and rebuild it. Up till now, much of the wall had been made of earth and timber; Severus replaced it with stone.

That completed, Severus marched north to the Antonine Wall, simply steamrolling what opposition he encountered on the way. Another rebuilding project on that wall, and Severus marched north again, into the wilds of Caledonia.

Here the going wasn’t so easy. Difficult terrain and the savage guerilla tactics of the barbarian defenders took a toll on the Romans. Severus began to retake the old forts built by Agricola, strengthening his own positions while at the same time conducting a scorched-earth campaign against the lands still held by the natives. In the face of this devastation, many of the tribes sought peace negotiations but were rebuffed by Severus.

In A.D. 210, with the native population at the breaking point, Septimius Severus decided to deliver the final hammer blow. He sent his son Caracalla with an army north of the Antonine Wall on what can only be described as a campaign of indiscriminate slaughter and destruction - everything and everyone was to be destroyed.

"Let none escape utter destruction at our hands. Yea, whatso is found in the womb of the mother, child unborn though it be, let it not escape utter destruction!" - Severus to Caracalla (Cassius Dio, Book 77, Part 15.)

Severus would then follow up with his own army and so, finally, subdue and occupy all of Caledonia.

However, it wasn’t to be. Severus fell ill in 210 and retired to the city of Eboracum - modern day York - where he slowly became worse until, finally, Caracalla was forced to call off the campaign and return to the dying Emperor. There, on his deathbed, Septimius Severus is said to have told his sons Caracalla and Geta the words by which he himself had lived and ruled for 17 years:

"Be harmonious, enrich the soldiers, scorn everybody else."  (Cassius Dio, Book 77, Part 16.)

Now, what about the coins?

Given his long reign and habit of paying enormous sums to the troops, coins of Septimius Severus are very plentiful and generally inexpensive. But of course there are the rarities, and one of the most interesting is this type, struck in bronze:

 

Septimius Severus augustus, 193 – 211. As 208, Æ 10.28g. SEVERVS – PIVS AVG Laureate head r. Rev. P M TR P XVI COS III P P S C Bridge with arches, towers at both ends; below, boat. C 523. BMC 857. RIC 786a var. (drapery on l. shoulder).

(Image from asearch.com; Numismatica Ars Classica NAC AG)

The bridge depicted on the reverse is thought to represent a military bridge built by Severus’s armies during the campaign in Britain. Many speculate the bridge was over the Firth of Forth but there is not a unanimous consensus. If it was the Firth, that would make it a structure to rival the great bridge Trajan built over the Danube river in A.D. 105:

 

(Reconstruction of the Roman Trajan's Bridge across the lower Danube by the engineer E. Duperrex in 1907; image from Wikipedia)

As CNG notes, “This rare coin copies the Danubian bridge type of Trajan (RIC II 569), and is possibly the bridge over the Firth of Forth, built for Severus’ British campaigns.”

An excellent article discussing the various theories about exactly which bridge/river, and their strengths and weaknesses, may be found here. I strongly recommend giving it a read!

You saw the nice one. (Hammered for 10,000 CHF back in 2018, by the way. 😮) Now here is my new mint-state, FDC example:

This coin caught my eye in a recent cgb.fr eAuction and I put it on my watch list, as I do with many coins which I find interesting enough to follow but not necessarily bid on. But as the end date grew nearer with the bidding still pretty low I decided to throw my hat into the ring, and ended up winning the coin for the princely sum of 26 EUR. Needless to say, despite the poor condition I am tickled pink at having been able to acquire such a rare coin type at such a low price!

(Condition matters, right? 😉)

This is considered a very rare or extremely rare coin, but exactly how rare? cgb.fr listed it as R3, which according to Numiswiki means 6-10 specimens known in the examined collections. I did a search on asearch and came up with about a dozen different examples of this coin type; there is one currently for sale on VCoins; and OCRE lists 3 additional specimens. All in all this makes about 16-17 specimens I can find recorded online (including mine.) I wonder what the total population might be; perhaps @curtislclay could give us an idea. In any case, it is not only quite rare but the unusual historical and architectural reverse makes it highly sought after by collectors.

It is almost cliché but when a coin is in this kind of condition, light angles and intensity can make a huge difference, and I will say that the coin does look (slightly) better in-hand than even this video shows:

 

Thank you for reading! Please feel free to post your own bargain rarities, coins of Septimius Severus, or anything else related and relevant!

Main sources:
Wikipedia online article Septimius Severus

Wikipedia online article Roman Invasion of Caledonia

Edited March 31, 2023 by CPK

[Sol_Invictus]

Excellent post, and congrats on winning such an interesting coin at such a low price!

[Nerosmyfavorite68]

That's an admirable and interesting acquisition! 

While he may lack the cool nickname of Nicephoros Phokas ('The White Death of the Saracens') or Sayf's 'The Sword of Destiny', yeah, I'd agree that Severus was one of the quintissential military emperors.

[Dwarf]

I am not familiar with the discussion on those "Scottish bridges" - but the same subject is discussed somewhat earlier and farther east concerning Trajan´s "Danuvian bridge"

For reading on this subject see Katharina Martin's paper (again unfortunately in German)
https://www.academia.edu/26981107/_Bridge_over_troubled_water_Detailstudien_zur_Frage_Donaubrücke_oder_Pons_Sublicius

As usual nothing can be proven, but the "target group" for Roman brass (sestertii, dupondii, asses) were the population in Italy, especially in Rome.
A Roman emperor would not have minted a coin showing Scottish bridges, who no one could identify, to impress a peasant around Loch Lomond, who would never see such a coin anyway.

Regards
Klaus

[Steppenfool]

Being from Scotland myself, it's quite odd that he's not really in the public consciouness at all. Everyone knows Antoninus of course (although I think people believe his name was literally Antonine), but Severus actually showed up for his mission unlike Antoninus, and launched a much more brutal and punative campaign. A lesson in history I suppose: a very long heap of dirt will do more for your legacy than mass killing and destruction.

I would have liked it if we had become more Romanized, purely so we could have more Roman sites to visit and explore.

Nice coin! The bridge outline is still clearly visible.

Edited March 31, 2023 by Steppenfool

[Al Kowsky]

On 3/30/2023 at 11:09 PM, CPK said:

I don’t know who comes to your mind when you think of the quintessential Roman military Emperor, but for me, I think of this guy:

(Bust of Septimius Severus, photo from Wikipedia)

Through and through the military Emperor, Septimius Severus had no time for the niceties of the Augustan Principate. He seized the throne openly through military force in A.D. 193 (following the chaos after Commodus’s assassination) and held it for over 17 years.

If there’s one thing you can say about Septimius Severus, it’s that he didn’t believe in doing things by halves. Massive armies and brutal campaigns became characteristic of his military style, right from the very beginning. Severus showed little mercy to his enemies and did not allow for second chances.

A fascinating part of this history is Septimius Severus’s campaign in Caledonia - what is now northern England and Scotland.

Gnaeus Julius Agricola, an energetic and accomplished general, had conquered much of northern Britain and Scotland one hundred fifty years previously, under the Flavians. But pressure from the native tribes and the logistical problems of maintaining a secure border so far from the epicenter of the Empire led to the gradual abandonment of these areas. Famously, the Emperor Hadrian (117 - 138) built a wall across the northern part of Britain, much of which still stands today, in order to provide added security and control over the region.

(Hadrian's Wall, image from Wikipedia)

Later, Hadrian’s successor Antoninus Pius (138 - 161) built a second wall, about 100 miles north of Hadrian’s:

(Image from Wikipedia)

By the time of Septimius Severus, the native Caledonians had pushed their way south past the Antonine Wall all the way to Hadrian’s Wall and beyond. Part of the problem lay in the fact that one of Septimius Severus’s rivals for the throne back in 193 had been the governor of Britain, a man named Clodius Albinus, and he had effectively stripped the province of soldiers to fight in the civil wars, leaving the frontier very thinly defended.

In 208 Severus intended to put a stop to the raids and incursions. He travelled north with a huge army, numbered at 40,000 men, and accompanied by his sons Antonius “Caracalla” and Geta.

First things first. Upon arrival at Hadrian’s Wall, Severus and his army stopped to strengthen and rebuild it. Up till now, much of the wall had been made of earth and timber; Severus replaced it with stone.

That completed, Severus marched north to the Antonine Wall, simply steamrolling what opposition he encountered on the way. Another rebuilding project on that wall, and Severus marched north again, into the wilds of Caledonia.

Here the going wasn’t so easy. Difficult terrain and the savage guerilla tactics of the barbarian defenders took a toll on the Romans. Severus began to retake the old forts built by Agricola, strengthening his own positions while at the same time conducting a scorched-earth campaign against the lands still held by the natives. In the face of this devastation, many of the tribes sought peace negotiations but were rebuffed by Severus.

In A.D. 210, with the native population at the breaking point, Septimius Severus decided to deliver the final hammer blow. He sent his son Caracalla with an army north of the Antonine Wall on what can only be described as a campaign of indiscriminate slaughter and destruction - everything and everyone was to be destroyed.

"Let none escape utter destruction at our hands. Yea, whatso is found in the womb of the mother, child unborn though it be, let it not escape utter destruction!" - Severus to Caracalla (Cassius Dio, Book 77, Part 15.)

Severus would then follow up with his own army and so, finally, subdue and occupy all of Caledonia.

However, it wasn’t to be. Severus fell ill in 210 and retired to the city of Eboracum - modern day York - where he slowly became worse until, finally, Caracalla was forced to call off the campaign and return to the dying Emperor. There, on his deathbed, Septimius Severus is said to have told his sons Caracalla and Geta the words by which he himself had lived and ruled for 17 years:

"Be harmonious, enrich the soldiers, scorn everybody else."  (Cassius Dio, Book 77, Part 16.)

Now, what about the coins?

Given his long reign and habit of paying enormous sums to the troops, coins of Septimius Severus are very plentiful and generally inexpensive. But of course there are the rarities, and one of the most interesting is this type, struck in bronze:

 

Septimius Severus augustus, 193 – 211. As 208, Æ 10.28g. SEVERVS – PIVS AVG Laureate head r. Rev. P M TR P XVI COS III P P S C Bridge with arches, towers at both ends; below, boat. C 523. BMC 857. RIC 786a var. (drapery on l. shoulder).

(Image from asearch.com; Numismatica Ars Classica NAC AG)

The bridge depicted on the reverse is thought to represent a military bridge built by Severus’s armies during the campaign in Britain. Many speculate the bridge was over the Firth of Forth but there is not a unanimous consensus. If it was the Firth, that would make it a structure to rival the great bridge Trajan built over the Danube river in A.D. 105:

 

(Reconstruction of the Roman Trajan's Bridge across the lower Danube by the engineer E. Duperrex in 1907; image from Wikipedia)

As CNG notes, “This rare coin copies the Danubian bridge type of Trajan (RIC II 569), and is possibly the bridge over the Firth of Forth, built for Severus’ British campaigns.”

An excellent article discussing the various theories about exactly which bridge/river, and their strengths and weaknesses, may be found here. I strongly recommend giving it a read!

You saw the nice one. (Hammered for 10,000 CHF back in 2018, by the way. 😮) Now here is my new mint-state, FDC example:

This coin caught my eye in a recent cgb.fr eAuction and I put it on my watch list, as I do with many coins which I find interesting enough to follow but not necessarily bid on. But as the end date grew nearer with the bidding still pretty low I decided to throw my hat into the ring, and ended up winning the coin for the princely sum of 26 EUR. Needless to say, despite the poor condition I am tickled pink at having been able to acquire such a rare coin type at such a low price!

(Condition matters, right? 😉)

This is considered a very rare or extremely rare coin, but exactly how rare? cgb.fr listed it as R3, which according to Numiswiki means 6-10 specimens known in the examined collections. I did a search on asearch and came up with about a dozen different examples of this coin type; there is one currently for sale on VCoins; and OCRE lists 3 additional specimens. All in all this makes about 16-17 specimens I can find recorded online (including mine.) I wonder what the total population might be; perhaps @curtislclay could give us an idea. In any case, it is not only quite rare but the unusual historical and architectural reverse makes it highly sought after by collectors.

It is almost cliché but when a coin is in this kind of condition, light angles and intensity can make a huge difference, and I will say that the coin does look (slightly) better in-hand than even this video shows:

 

 

Thank you for reading! Please feel free to post your own bargain rarities, coins of Septimius Severus, or anything else related and relevant!

Main sources:
Wikipedia online article Septimius Severus

Wikipedia online article Roman Invasion of Caledonia

CPK, Congrats on scoring an example of this iconic rarity & thanks for posting this interesting article ☺️. I have one bronze rarity that's been posted a number of times but will post again for this thread. This coin was no bargain, it cost me an arm & leg 💪🦵, but I was thrilled to get it. Many new collectors aren't aware that Severus was born in Africa, & he was looked down upon by the Roman senate because of this 😒.

 

 

Edited April 1, 2023 by Al Kowsky
correction

[CPK]

7 hours ago, Steppenfool said:

 

Nice coin! The bridge outline is still clearly visible.

Thanks! In hand, not only are the bridge arches and towers visible but also part of the "COS III..." legend, as well as the boat and a couple of the figures on the bridge.

[seth77]

Here is another most curious Septimius Severus:

I wrote a post about it here.

Edited March 31, 2023 by seth77

[Ryro]

Sweet bargain coin!

Septimius Severus really was the quintessential military ruler:

Here are a few bargain buys of his:

 

[Nerosmyfavorite68]

It's always nice to obtain a rarity.

It appears that I haven't added any Severus coins since the 90's, with the exception of a rather grotty small provincial, back from when Incitatus Coins would have the 'ridiculous deal  of the week.'

 

[curtislclay]

@CPK

My die catalogue of Severan asses, which I drew up mainly in the 1970s, with only occasional later additions, now includes 32 Bridge asses of Septimius, struck from three reverse and five obverse dies.

Assuming a connection of the Bridge type to Septimius' British expedition, it would seem natural to date these asses to the second half of 208, leaving the first half open for the celebration in Rome of Caracalla's decennalia and the joint consulship of Caracalla and Geta on 1 January 208, followed by the march to Britain presumably in spring-summer 208. However, a large bronze medallion of the bridge type turned up in a CNG sale some years ago, and I have been able to show that virtually all Roman bronze medallions, along with a substantial issue of ordinary copper asses, were regularly struck at Rome each year for use as New Year's gifts on 1 January.  So it seems probable  that the Bridge medallion and the Bridge asses were struck not late in 208, but rather for distribution on 1 January of that year, and a die link on the unique Paris aureus of the same Bridge type supports this chronology. So possibly the Bridge type commemorates an event of 207, rather than the construction of a bridge in Britain towards the end of 208?

 

[Ancient Coin Hunter]

Here's my denarius which seemingly celebrates his voyage to Britain and fair winds and following seas, characterized by a nude standing Neptune with trident...

 

Also, I like to show this tondo, probably from Egypt, which depicts the Imperial family with the face of the unfortunate Geta rubbed off.

 

 

Edited April 1, 2023 by Ancient Coin Hunter