Maximian Follis Pair - Coin Community Forum

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Marcus Aurelius Valerius Maximianus was raised up by Diocetian to rule jointly with him, and when the latter abdicated for health reasons, Maximian also resigned. He returned to his former office the very next year, however, to aid his son Maxentius' efforts to succeed him, but in this he was thwarted, and was once again forced to retire.

A few years later Maximian attempted to usurp Constantine the Great, but found he had insufficient resources to carry this off. Taken captive by Constantine, he was compelled to commit suicide. While Constantine was still contending with Maxentius, he issued a decree of damnatio memoriae with regard to Maximian, but after the son's death he rehabilitated the father's memorry and actually had him deified.

The first coin here is roughly 28 mm in diameter and weighs 9.7 grams. I have it as RIC VI 10b, struck at Cyzicus.

The second specimen is about 29 mm across with the weight coming in at 9.9 grams. The mint mark on this one has me stumped. Aquilea, perhaps?

Well, I usually don't get crickets like this when I ask a question. Have I finally confounded everybody?

A follis of Maximian is quite a common item, with several thousand being auctioned over just the past decade. But the one I've posted here with the bizarre mint mark, which matches none of those, is it the exception, an uncatalogued and undocumented rarity?

This is the closest thing I could find regarding that mint mark: https://www.acsearch.info/search.html?id=8922430

Your issue is that it's Galerius, not Maximian http://numismatics.org/ocre/id/ric.6.rom.95b

Maximian was never Caesar on coins. Things get even trickier when Galerius becomes Augustus. It's all in the nose...

Galerius as Augustus, 305-307

London. Bronze, 26mm, 9.6g. IMP MAXIMIANVS P F AVG. GENIO POPV-LI ROMANI (RIC 52b).

Maximian, 300

London. Bronze, 26mm, 9.4g. IMP C MAXIMIANVS P F AVG. GENIO POPV-LI ROMANI (RIC 6b).

Edited by JohnConduitt
05/27/2022 1:18 pm

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Well, that's the answer, although not at all the one I expected. Gaius Galerius Valerius Maximianus. I'd never had a Galerius, and so didn't realize that his issues could be marked simply Maximianus. I concur that it's thus RIC VI 95b (Rome). Nothing special.

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