Trajan Silver Denarius “pietas” — Optimo Princ — Certificate Of Authenticity

This silver denarius of Trajan, struck at Rome and identified by the typological pairing RIC 104 / Woytek 348b, shows on the reverse the personification of Pietas performing a ritual gesture before a lit altar, a composition described consistently in the standard numismatic corpora and reference catalogues for the COS V series of Trajan’s principate.

Careful observation under ×10 magnification and raking light: the visual examination of both sides, carried out through successive reading of the rim, fields, reliefs, and legends, highlights an ancient hammer strike on a slightly irregular flan, whose perimeter shows natural edge variations, while the laurelled portrait on the obverse remains sharp in its volumes (wreath, eye, nose, mouth line, modeling of the neck), and the reverse preserves an intelligible scene, with the figure of Pietas, the altar to the left, and the exergual PIET—elements that ensure immediate identification of the type, even when certain peripheral letters appear weaker or partly off flan, a frequent occurrence in this coinage.

On the obverse, the legend IMP TRAIANO AVG GER DAC P M TR P surrounds a laurelled bust right with slight drapery, in accordance with the standard description of this type, and the rendering of the face, sober and classical in style, corresponds well to the official iconography of the reign.

On the reverse, the full titulature COS V P P S P Q R OPTIMO PRINC accompanies the scene of Pietas sacrificing (the gesture of sprinkling incense) before the lit altar, while holding the scepter, with PIET in the exergue—exactly the combination given for RIC 104 and regularly illustrated in numismatic publications.

Authority: TRAJAN (98–117).

Denomination / metal: AR Denarius.

Mint: Rome.

Obverse: IMP TRAIANO AVG GER DAC P M TR P, laurelled bust right, with slight drapery.

Reverse: COS V P P S P Q R OPTIMO PRINC / PIET, Pietas standing left, sprinkling incense on a lit altar and holding a scepter.

References: Woytek 348b ; RIC 104.

Weight / diameter: 3.14 g ; 19 mm

Under Trajan, the formula OPTIMO PRINC forms part of an image policy in which the emperor presents himself as the guarantor of moral and civic order, and the emphasis on Pietas—ritual virtue, fidelity to the gods, to duties, and to the public forms of religion—belongs to a highly legible monetary language by which Rome recalls that imperial prosperity must be understood as the effect of a just relationship between the city, its institutions, and the sacred.

For a collector, this issue offers a particularly attractive balance between the political force of the titulature (“best of princes”) and the iconographic density of a codified religious scene, whose reading remains immediate—Pietas, the altar, the exergual PIET—and which makes the coin at once a historical document, a witness to civic ideology, and an object of style, for Trajanic engraving, even across its die variants, willingly retains that sense of order and measure that has made the reign’s numismatic reputation.

Each specimen is examined, described, and accompanied by a certificate of authenticity consistent with the standards of the art and heritage market; the study is conducted with careful observation under ×10 magnification and raking light; provenance is European and from an established numismatic dealer; and the acquisition stems from a specialized international transaction carried out within a recognized numismatic network and validated by reference experts, according to the highest standards of the art and heritage market.

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