Roman Republican - Ancient Coin References including Auction Catalogs

There are excellent selections of Roman Republican coins in very many catalogs. Most catalogs of major firms have Roman coins, and most selections of Roman coins include some Republican coins.  So this list will be abbreviated to only truly outstanding or comprehensive selections.

See Andrew McCabe's site on Roman Republican coins and books for a more extensive annotated list. 

Books. Collectors of Republican coins are blessed with many good reference books. In order of usefulness, here are some.

Sear, David. Roman Coins and Their Values, the Millennium Edition, volume 1. 2000.  [Almost all types are listed, with many illustrated, and a few have one-line comments. An excellent checklist.]

Roman Silver Coins I: Republic to Augustus, third edition, originally by H.A. Seaby and then with Sear and Loosley.  1978. [This book is arranged in an outdated manner which turns out to be remarkably useful at times. Before the chronology of Republican coins was known, they were grouped by family of the moneyer, which this book uses (Modern books arrange them in chronological order.) It is still common in Europe for coins to be offered by family, and if you want to find their modern ID this book comes in handy. It gives references to Crawford (the main scholarly work) and Sydenham (outdated and almost useless).

    If you want the best, your choice is clear. Roman Republican Coinage by Michael Crawford (1973) is still the standard reference. A huge 2-volume work, it will cost you $400 or more. But, it has most of what there is to know about Republican coins. It is both a complete list with type numbers, and an extensive discussion of everything relating to Republican coins, often in great depth. Beginners will use the reference numbers and gradually learn that the rest is extremely valuable and fascinating. By the way, Crawford omitted most of the amusing anecdotes about the moneyers because they were already published in BMC Roman Republican by Grueber. For another $250 or so you can get the stories in 3-volume very old book with outdated dating of the issues.

    The Coinage of the Roman Republic, by Sydenham, was written long ago (1952) but is still available in reprint (with reduced size, so the photographs are all too small!). It is outdated, with important dates we now know to be wrong. Skip it.

    If your interest is in the imperators (during the transition from the Republic to the empire) you are in luck. David Sear has written The History and Coinage of the Roman Imperators 49 BC - 27 BC, which is about as complete as you could ever wish for. If you want to know a lot about your coins and the time period, this is the last word, and it includes a price guide too. It costs about $95 and is well worth it.

    If your Republican coin was minted between 63 and 49 BC, there is a good work by Michael Harlan, Roman Republican Moneyers and Their Coins, 63 BC - 49 BC, which tells the entire story of each type (up to five pages on a single type!) and as much as is known about the moneyers. The editors did not organize the pictures well, but the types are illustrated. It is a pity that the rest of the Republican series does not have such excellent sources as these last two. Harlen recently (2012) self-published a companion volume, Roman Republican Moneyers and Their Coins, 81 BCE - 64 BCE, and did a much better job than Seaby at illustrating the types. If you have any Republican coins from that time period it is an excellent book. Be aware that not everyone agrees with his dates (Dating Republican coins is challenging. I have a website on how it is done. It begins with a page of examples and has a linked page of theory.)

There are many other useful books on Republican coins, but I switch here to outstanding sale catalogs.

 


Sale Catalogs 

The first two are probably the best single-volume sales of RR coins:

Leu 17
(5/77)  MQP.  913 superb Roman Republican silver on 39 ppl + 2 E, with many great rarities.  (This issue of Leu is very hard to find.) 

Lanz 88  (11/98)  HV, HQP, "Sammlung Leo Benz" (one of three Lanz sales of the Benz collection -- only Lanz 88 has Roman Republican) 978 ancients on 43 ppl. + 5 color E. 43 ppl. 886 RR (very high quality Roman Republican, mostly AR), 102 Augustus
    Roman Republican (886), Augustus (102)

NAC 61 (2011, Oct. 5-6) HV. HQP. 1220 Roman Republican, "The RBW Collection of Roman Republican Coins, Part I." 1220 RR, many AE. Very high quality and many rarities, including 14 Italian of the Social War. Spectacular! 
   Roman Republican (1220), Italian of the Social War (14)

63 (2012, May 17) 608 Roman Republican, "The RBW Collection of Roman Republican Coins, Part II."608 RR, very high quality and many rarities.
    Roman Republican (608)


70 (2013, May 16) "The Collection of Roman Republican Coins of a Student and his Mentor" (part 1 of 3) VHV. HQP. 200 outstanding Roman Republican coins, including gold and many of the highest desirability.
    Roman Republican (200)
73  (2013, Nov. 18) HV. VHQP. "Collection of Roman Republican Coins of Student and his Mentor, part II" 277 Roman Republican coins,, some extremely high value.
    Roman Republican (277)
83  (2015, May 20) HV. VHQP. "Collection of Roman Republican Coins of Student and his Mentor, part III" 307 Roman Republican coins,, some extremely high value.
    Roman Republican (307)
92  (2016, May 23-24) in two parts. Part I VHV. VHQP.  1018 ancients. 173 G, 210 RR (including an excellent EID MAR piece), 442 RI (including 51 Julian and Festival of Isis and many of the latest emperors in gold), 11 DA, 182 By (all gold except for late silver)
  Roman Republican (210), Festival of Isis and Julian (51), 5th century emperors in gold (c. 50)
    Part II: HV. HQP. "Featuring the collection of E. E. Clain-Stefanelli" 1251 ancients. 7 Celtic, 158 G, 470 RR "An interesting collection of Roman Republican coins formed by an Engish amateur scholar", 572 RI, 5 DA, 60 Byz
   Roman Republican (470)



CNG  "The Goodman Collection" 43, 44 = Triton I, 45, 46, 47.  One of the best overall collections sold, but not in a single volume.
    43  (9/97)  mbs. 2788 ancients among 3127. 905 G, 296 RP, 566 RR ("Goodman I"), 868 RI, 15 DA, 101 Byz, 34 Celtic England, 3 English DA
    Roman Republican (566), RP (296)
**** For the major importance of CNG 43 through 47 because they have the Goodman collection of Roman Republican coins, see Andrew McCabe's site and commentary on them.
    44 is Triton I  (joint offering of CNG, Freeman & Sear, and NAC) High to very high value coins with very high quality presentation.
(12/97)  1947 ancients among 2308, many enlargements throughout + 7 color E.  655 G, 95 RP, 85 aes grave, 435 RR (Goodman, part II, including very many struck AE), 480 RI, 3 DA, 32 Beneventum, 64 Byz, 26 Celtic England, 17 British
    Beneventum (32),  Roman Republican AE (cast and struck, among 520), Roman gold (100+)
    45  (3/98)  2556 ancients among 3080.  808 G, 289 RP (including Syrian tetradrachms), 509 RR AE, 200 RR AR), 604 RI, 15 DA, 61 Byz, 36 Celtic England, 12 English DA, 15 English
    Roman Republican AE ("Goodman 3") (509)
    46  (6/98)  mbs. 1694 ancients among 2101. 656 G, 141 Armenian, 138 RP, 178 RR (again Goodman), 400 RI, 11 DA, 112 Byz, 34 Celtic England, 7 English DA , 17 English
    Armenian ("Araratian, part 2") (141), Holy Land city coins (57), more Goodman (178)



NFA XXVII  (12/91)  VHV. VHQP. Horizontal format. 662 ancients. 88 G, 574 R.  Plus 8 ppl of enlargements plus some enlargements throughout plus 4 ppl of single-sided huge color enlargements. Excellent! (Including one of only two coins of usurper Saturninus, an amazing aureus.)
    Roman Republican AR (426) 

Kunker
124  (2007, March 16-17. "Dr. Adolf Wild Collection" MV. HQP.  1966 ancients, all in color (no enlargements). 272 gold (including 10 Celtic, 36 G, 7 RR, 34 RI, 2 DA, 77 Byz, 5 world), 23 Celtic, 298 G, 83 Roman Egypt (Alexandria), 374 RR, 186 Augustus, 246 other twelve Caesars, 458 RI, 13 tessera, 3 DA, 5 Byz
    RR (Roman Republican, 374), Augustus (186), twelve Caesars after Augustus (246)

Vecchi 3 (9/96) A specialized collection of struck bronzes, the best single-volume private collection I know of. 646 Roman Republican struck AE, illustrated throughout.
    Roman Republican struck AE (646)
Vecchi 6 (6/97)  1575 ancients among 2253 on 81 ppl + 3 E among 135 ppl.  92 Celtic, 512 G, 887 R, 63 Byz, 5 DA,
    Carthage, Roman Republican AE (282), Roman Republican AR (143), Constantine of London (14), Samarian (16, not enlarged)

Tkalec.
2008, Feb. 29.  HV, VHQP.  "Collection of Roman Republican" 538 ancients among 725, all in color and all x2 in color, plus 3 ppl of even greater enlargements in color.  388 RR,  46 G, 98 RI, 6 Byz, 4 DA. (Includes a superb IDE MAR)
    Roman Republican (393)

2008, Sept 8.  HV. VHQP. 393 ancients among 978, all in color plus 27 ppl of color enlargements of ancients. 48 G, "A collection of Roman Republican denarii, part II" 142 RR silver, "A collection of Roman Republican bronzes, part II" RR AE 75, RR AV 3, 69 RI gold, 51 RI.
    Roman Republican (220)



AstArte (Lugano, Switzerland)
XVI (26-27 Nov. 2004)  MV. HQP. All coins illustrated throughout in color. No enlargements.  968 ancients, 27 large lots of ancients, 73 world, 260 medals, many large and some very large. 100 G, 555 RR, 231 RI, 85 Byz.
    Roman Republican (555)

NAC (Numismatica Ars Classica) 
7  (3/94)  HV. VHQP.  891 ancients on 78 ppl + 3 E + 8 ppl in color.  143 Etruscan, 107 G, 207 Italian aes grave, 84 RR struck AE, 374 R.
    Etruscan (174), Italian aes grave (207) 5 (1994) and 9 (1996) contain 400 Aes Grave between them.
8  (4/95)  HV. VHQP.  981 ancients on 68 ppl + 12 E + 8 colr E.  451 G, 279 Republican AR and AE, 246 Roman imperial
    Roman Republican AE (100), Greek AE of Italy (148)
9  (4/96)  VHV. VHQP. 965 on 85 ppl + 8 E + 12 color E.  352 G, 180 aes grave, 230 R Republican, 190 R imperial
    Republican, aes grave (180 on 28 ppl)
10  (4/97)  VHV. VHQP. 819 ancients on 70 ppl + 12 E + 16 color E. 265 G, 117 aes grave, 21 medallions, 15 contorniates, 328 R, 30 Byz, 48 Beneventum
    aes grave (117 on 19 ppl), Roman medallions (21), contorniates (15), Beneventum (48)
11  (4/98)  HV. VHQP. 639 ancients on 53 ppl + 5 E + 16 color E. 120 G, 221 Roman Republican, 230 Roman imperial, 27 Byz, 20 DA.
    Roman Republican (221)


NAC 64 (2012, May 17-18) 2233 ancients. HV and VHV. A very thick catalog with two sections of Greek through Roman coins, listed individually here. 252 G, "J. N. collection of Roman Republican coins" including 71 RR cast AE and 62 RR, 380 RI, 4 DA, 19 Byz, "Paulo Leito collection of coins of the Iberian Peninsula (Spain)" 56, ("A collection of coins of the Levant and Jewish coins" including Philistia 87, Samaria 77, fractional AR of Judah 75, Jewish 100, Nabatean silver 6, Holy Land city coins 111), 290 G, 80 RR, 428 RI, 65 Byz.
     "A collection of coins of the Levant and Jewish coins" including Philistia 87, Samaria 77, fractional AR of Judah 75, Jewish 100, Nabatean silver 6, Holy Land city coins 111, Roman Republican cast AE (71)     

Ratto (New York) 1930, "Joseph Martini collection Monnaies de la Republique Romaine.A classic collection, with 40 excellent plates.

Sternberg 32  (10/96)  MV. HQP. 862 ancients (+ 17 Renaissance medals). 75 G, 787 R. On 42 ppl + 2 E + 3 color.
    Republican (484) (on 25 page plates)

M&M GMBH (Weil am Rhein) 
19 (2006, May 16) "Sammlung Righetti part 7" MV. MQP. 854 ancients among 1578. 332 Roman Provincial from the Righetti collection (especially Kilicia = Cilicia, 229), 102 Greek, another 38 RP, 342 RR including many struck AE (The Gibboni collection), 36 RI.
   
 332 Roman Provincial from the Righetti collection including 229 from Kilikia = Cilicia, Roman Republican stuck AE (many among 342 RR)

The New York Sale 3  (2000, Dec. 7)  830 HV ancients.  207 G, 18 RP, 386 RR (The Rudman collection), 183 RI, 26 Byz, 11 DA.
    Roman Republican silver (383),  Samaria (25)

Künker (Fritz Rudolf Künker Munzhandlung, Osnabrück, Germany)  11 3/4" by 8 1/4"  Excellent photographs.  Catalogs in German.
124  (2007, March 16-17. "Dr. Adolf Wild Collection" MV. HQP.  1966 ancients, all in color (no enlargements). 272 gold (including 10 Celtic, 36 G, 7 RR, 34 RI, 2 DA, 77 Byz, 5 world), 23 Celtic, 298 G, 83 Roman Egypt (Alexandria), 375 RR, 186 Augustus, 246 twelve Caesars, 458 RI, 13 tessera, 3 DA, 5 Byz
    RR (Roman Republican, 375), Augustus (186), twelve Caesars (after Augustus, 246)

Glendining & Co.
1975, Oct. 8.  "Harwood collection, Part 1, Republican denarii." (Part 2 is Roman imperial coins) 353 Roman Republican silver with the best 202 on 9 B&W ppl, with photographs too dark which could have been much better.
    Roman Republican (202)


Gemini XI (Berk) (2012, Jan 8) HV. HQP. 767 lots of ancients including 182 from the Phil Davis collection of Dacian and other imitations of Roman Republican denarii. 236 G, 14 RR, 21 RI before Vespasian, 207 Flavian (Vespasian-Domitian, with emphasis on Jewish-related), 49 RI post Flavian, 24 Byz, 31 English hammered.
    Flavian (Vespasian-Domitian) 207, Roman Republican denarius imitations (182 lots)


Aureo & Calico (Barcelona, Spain) (2012, Oct. 3) "Coleccion V.F.C" A collection of 759 Roman Republican coins, arranged by gens!  They are not of the highest quality, but they are numerous!
    Roman Republican (759)

 


NAC E, F, H, K, and P have strong, if not highly valuable, selections of Republican coins with especially good selections of AE.
E  (4/95)  1313 ancients among 1389 on 62 ppl among 67 ppl.  614 G, 698 R, 30 crusader.
    Roman Republican struck AE (77), Greek AE of Italy (190)
F  (4/96)  728 ancients on 39 ppl. 303 G, 402 R, 23 Byz.
    Roman Republican struck AE (56)
H  (4/98)  1325 ancients on 69 ppl + 21 ppl of large lots.  455 G, 802 R, 66 Byz
    Aes grave (5 ppl)
K  (3/00)  1133 ancients on 72 ppl.  387 G, 742 R, 4 Byz.
    Aes grave (6 ppl)
P   (2005, May 12) 1261ancients, illustrated throughout in B&W. 610 G, 240 RR, 357 RI, 49 Byz.
    Roman Republican (240)

Peus 322  (1988, Nov. 1). MV. MQP. "Sammlung eines Fachgelehrten Munzen der Romischen Republik"  A thin catalog of 646 Roman Republican coins (only) on 26 ppl. Some AE, mostly denarii. Very nice, but not spectacular, coins.
    Roman Republican (646)

Owl Ltd. andThomas P. McKenna, "The Aurelia Collection" (c. 11/1990) MV. MQP. Small-format fixed-price catalog, 300 RR coins, almost all photographed. A nice collection but not with the major rarities.

Sternberg 15  (4/85)  MV. HQP. Hardcover.  864 ancients on 39 ppl + 4 E + 2 color ppl, among 54 ppl.  165 G, 24 aes grave on 4 ppl, 5 Italian social war, 110 RR including 15 early quinarii and many imperatorial, 524 RI (with 8 ppl of late Roman AE including 3 contorniates), 31 Byz
    late Roman AE (on 8 ppl)

UBS  (2008, Sept. 9-10) "Important Collection of Roman Gold and Silver Coins." Hardcover. HV. HQP.  1061 ancients, all in color illustrated throughout and many with enlargements. 82 G, 2RR, 135 R Imperatorial, 173 Augustus, 118 Julio-Claudians, 6 civil war, 531 RI, 13 Byz.
    Roman Imperatorial (135), Augustus (173),
Julio-Claudians (118), and civil war (6)


Comptoir General Financier (Prier) (Paris, France)
Monnaies 52 (2012, Feb. 9) 446 Republican (not high quality, but well-photographed in color and with long descriptions in French. Estimates were high for the quality and many did not sell and many that did sell went for the minimum).
    Republican (446)

 


Articles.  There are too many articles to list, but here are two good ones for advanced collectors:

Mattingly, Harold B. "The Mesagne hoard and the coinage of the late Republic," Numismatic Chronicle 155 (1995) 101-108, pl.19-21
Duncan-Jones, R.P. "Change in the late Republican denarius,"
Numismatic Chronicle 155 (1995) 109-117

 


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