The Apotheosis of Romulus

sulla80
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The Apotheosis

The official story is that Romulus was taken up to heaven. On the seventh of July, Romulus was conducting a public sacrifice outside the city, at a place called the Goat's Marsh with the senate and most of the people present. A sudden storm broke. The sky darkened, a cloud descended to the ground, and violent winds and rain scattered the crowd. When the weather cleared, Romulus was gone. He was never found, alive or dead.

This day was by Plutarch's time called the Capratine Nones, "Nones of the Wild Fig Tree" - a women's festival held under a wild fig tree on the Campus Martius, associated in Roman tradition with the disappearance of Romulus at the Goat's Marsh (Caprae Palus).

The senate's official story was that Romulus was translated bodily into godhood, an apotheosis.

Quirinus

A respected man named Proculus Julius later swore on oath that he had personally seen Romulus ascending to heaven in full armor and had heard the king's voice instructing the Romans to worship him under a new divine name: Quirinus. Quirinus thereafter became one of the three principal gods of the early Roman state, alongside Jupiter and Mars, and was given his own flamen (priest), the flamen Quirinalis, who remained one of the senior priesthoods of Rome through the time of the Roman empire.

The Suspicion

Romulus was not at this time the most beloved king, especially amongst the senatorial class. Some suspected another possibility.

Upon this a grievous suspicion attached itself to the patricians, and an accusing story was current among the people to the effect that they had long been weary of kingly rule, and desired to transfer the power to themselves, and had therefore made away with the king. And indeed it had been noticed for some time that he treated them with greater harshness and arrogance. This suspicion the patricians sought to remove by ascribing divine honours to Romulus, on the ground that he was not dead, but blessed with a better lot.
-Plutarch, The Life of Numa, 2.2

Perhaps not surprising that a king who killed his own brother wasn't the most warm and friendly fellow.

The Interregnum

The 150 senators/patricians divided themselves into groups to share power. Each man would wear the royal insignia, perform sacrifices, and exercise authority for a strictly defined period: six hours of the day and six hours of the night. Sabines and Romans debated how to resolve their differences and select a successor to Romulus. They concluded that the Romans would choose a Sabine to rule.

The Romans selected Numa Pompilius, a Sabine man renowned for his virtue and philosophical thoughtfulness. Spurius Vettius, serving his 12 hour shift as king, put the vote to the citizens. The consensus was immediate; the Sabines were even more eager to accept Numa than the Romans were to nominate him. This small moment gave Spurius Vettius a lasting place in Roman history - a moment that is the most accepted explanation for who it could be that we see on today's coin.

The Coin

Catalogued by Crawford as 404/1 is a denarius serratus, struck on a flan whose edge has been notched with a series of triangular cuts before striking, producing a sawtooth profile around the rim. The serratus form was used intermittently from the Second Punic War onward and concentrated in the period c. 118 to 59 BC. The reasons for serration remain debated: most scholars favor an anti-counterfeiting rationale; others have proposed decoration, fiduciary signaling to non-Roman trading partners, or simply tradition.

Roman Republican, T. Vettius Sabinus, 66 BC, AR denarius (19mm, 3.71g, 6h), Rome. Obv: SABINVS - S•C, bare and bearded head of King Tatius to right; below chin, monogram of TA.

Rev: IVDEX / T•VETT[IVS] Togate figure in slow biga to left, holding reins in his right hand and scepter in his left; behind, grain ears.

Ref: Babelon (Vettia) 2. Crawford 404/1. RBW 1446. Sydenham 905.

Notes: Banker's mark on the obverse, otherwise, very fine. ex Leu Web Auction 40 Lot 1248 14-Mar-2026

The Moneyer

Little survives about T. Vettius Sabinus, the moneyer, beyond this coinage. Crawford suggests, on the basis of In Verrem III.168, that he had probably already served as quaestor before his year at the mint; the identification is plausible but not certain.

Crawford identifies him in RRC as likely the quaestor referenced from In Verrem (against Verres) where Cicero accuses Gaius Verres, the former propraetor (governor) of Sicily, of systemic extortion (repetundae), embezzlement, and cruelty.

"Vettius, your intimate friend; Vettius, your kinsman by marriage; Vettius, the brother of your own quaestor, testifies via correspondence to your blatant theft and undeniable embezzlement (peculatus)."
-Cicero, In Verrem iii.168

and the same Titus Vettius who was propraetor (governor) in Africa.

"You, O Titus Vettius, if any inheritance in Africa comes to you, will you abandon it? or, will you retain it as your own, without being liable to the imputation of avarice, without any sacrifice of your dignity?"
-Cicero, Pro Flacco 85

The Obverse

The bearded head facing right is identified as TA (in ligature) below the chin and SABINVS in the field - eliminating any ambiguity about who is shown on this coin. The figure is Titus Tatius, the legendary Sabine king of Cures who in the foundation narrative made war upon Romulus's Rome to recover the abducted Sabine women. An who, after the women's intervention on the battlefield, accepted a treaty creating a joint kingship with Romulus over a unified Roman-Sabine community. Our moneyer links his name to the King with the SABINVS legend.

The Reverse

The reverse is less obvious and still contested. The IVDEX not a reference to a specific role, but plausibly declaring the quasi-judicial role of Spurius Vettius in bringing to vote Numa Pompilius the king. This would also serve to claim Spurius Vettius as an ancestor of the moneyer - the sort of prestigious connection to a legendary Roman that could enhance his political career.

The grain ear too could reinforce the Numa connection. Numa's reign was, in the Roman tradition, the founding instance of a peace so complete that the doors of the temple of Janus stayed shut for forty-three years - a closure that would happen only once more, briefly, in the next half-millennium of Roman history before Augustus closed the doors again in 29 BC.

In Context, 66 BC

The year in which this coin was issued was not a peaceful one. While T. Vettius worked at the Roman mint, the tribune Gaius Manilius was carrying a law that handed the eastern command to Pompey the Great, a step toward the eventual empire. Cicero, then praetor, gave his first political speech in support of Manilius' law. The Senate opposed it and lost. The doors of the temple of Janus stayed open (at war).

The principal political question of the year, debated in the same forum where Spurius Vettius had once put Numa's election to the vote, was whether the Roman state could continue to govern itself by traditional procedure or whether it would be reshaped by extraordinary commands granted to individual men. T. Vettius's coin, with its S·C asserting senatorial authorization, its grain ear evoking Numa's abundance, and its togate figure invoking the procedural moment that gave Rome its peace king, could be read as a quiet position on that question.

References

NGC Ancients: Roman Republican Serrati," (2019).
M. H. Crawford, Roman Republican Coinage, 2 vols. (Cambridge, 1974), no. 404/1 (vol. I, p. 415; obv./rev. die count, vol. II).
C. A. Hersh and A. Walker, "The Mesagne Hoard," American Numismatic Society Museum Notes 29 (1984), 103–134.
T. R. S. Broughton, The Magistrates of the Roman Republic, 3 vols. (New York, 1951–1986).
Cicero, De imperio Cn. Pompei (= Pro lege Manilia), 66 BC. Cicero's speech in support of the lex Manilia.
Alexandru Marian, Serrated Roman Republican Denarii, Forum Anceint Coins
Tyler Rossi, How Were Roman Serrate Coins Made and Why?, CoinWeek, 2022