THE ROMAN STANDARDS,

WITH SOME NOTICES OF THE TESTIMONY OF COINS TO THEIR DEVICES.

UPON the reverse of a denarius of Augustus Cæsar we find the inscription SIGNIs receptis S. P. Q. R. around a blank shield surrounded by a legionary ensign and eagle. This is a historical coin. When the Cantabrian war was ended, Augustus began his preparations for a campaign against the Parthians. But Phraates, their King, hearing of the impending danger, and unwilling to become involved in hostilities with Rome, sued for peace, offering to restore the standards and military ensigns captured from Crassus and Marc Antony, and to permit all Romans who were held as prisoners to return to their homes, if they should so desire. This offer Augustus was very glad to accept. The ultimate end of a campaign, if successful, would have been but the recovery of the standards and the prisoners, only to have been accomplished by bloodshed and hardships. When the result was attained by peace negotiations, the glory was as great, if not even greater, while the actual trouble was slight and the risk infinitesimal. Augustus, therefore, took great credit to himself for his bloodless victory, and plumed himself upon the accomplishment; he issued other denarii bearing memorials of this event, which we also find commemorated upon those of the families Aquilia, Caninia, Durmia, and Petronia.

Upon the coins of later Emperors we find references to other recoveries of standards which had been lost by the Romans in battle against the Germans, Parthians, Sarmatians, and others. Tacitus narrates at considerable length the circumstances attending the restoration of the eagles which had been captured by Arminius from the legions of Varus.

The loss of standards and military insignia has always been considered, both in ancient and modern times, as the most ignominious and disgraceful event that could befall an enemy; and their recapture was the only means by which such a dishonor could be wiped out. The standard was the centre of the battle, and around it, then as now, the combat raged most fiercely and the field was most hotly contested.

We find in antiquity the use of standards coeval with the existence of armed and military bodies. Each tribe of the Israelites had its badge or cognizance under which it was marshalled for battle and civil purposes. Ephraim carried a steer; Benjamin, a wolf; Judah, a lion, &c. The Athenians used the owl; the Thebans, the sphynx; and other Greecian nations adopted various standards.

By the raising or lowering of the insignia the march and manoeuvres of bodies of men were directed; when upraised in the air, it was a signal to attack, when lowered, an order for retreat. The eagle was a favorite symbol of sovereignty, as that bird was the companion of Jove, and the ruler over all birds; its boldness and rapacity well fitted it to be the chosen emblem of empire and of victory. Cyrus's special ensign was an eagle of gold fastened to a long spear; the other kingly insignia were of gold or silver, as the case happened. The eagle was the hieroglyphic symbol of the cities of Antioch, Emesus, Heliopolis, and Tyre, and appears in grandeur upon the coinage of the Ptolemies.

Among the attributes of royalty which the Tuscans once sent to Rome as a token of amity, was an eagle of ivory, and from that time forward the eagle was adopted by the Romans, and remained as one of the chief emblems of that nation during the existence of the Republic. The Roman eagle was of gold or silver, about the size of a pigeon, borne aloft upon the apex of a spear. Until the time of Cæsar it was perched upon thunderbolts, but these appendages he caused to be disused. The small size of the bird, while it in no wise interfered with its value as an ensign, very much facilitated its concealment in the event of a reverse happening to an army. In later times the eagle became a symbol of empire for other nations. It was used upon the seal of Otho, Emperor of Germany, and upon the coinage of Philip, King of France. The rulers of Prussia, Poland, Russia, Sardinia, Sicily, and Spain, and many barons, counts, and princes of the German Empire adopted it, and at the present time it is the cognizance of the United States of America, and appears as the badge of several European orders. The Roman eagle, made of gilt metal, and carried on a long staff, was chosen by Napoleon for his armies.

The double-headed eagle first appears among the Emperors of the East, and symbolized their dominion over both the Eastern and Western empires.

In modern times the most noted banner is the Oriflamme of France. This was originally presented by the Abbey of St. Denis to its feudal lord, whenever it was necessary for him to take the field for the protection of its rights and possessions. When Philip I. became the Lord Protector of the Abbey, it became his duty to bear this banner, which he carried with the royal armies. It subsequently became the standard of the kingdom, but since the time of Charles VII. it has never been carried in battle. The Oriflamme was a piece of red taffeta, (whence the name,) fixed

on a golden spear in the form of a banner, and cut into three points, each of which was adorned with tassels of green silk.

To return to the Romans. In addition to eagles, this nation used other standards. Romulus, on one occasion, being taken by surprise and having nothing better at hand, improvised an ensign composed of "a bottle of hay fastened to the top of a spear. In early times the Roman standards represented eagles, dragons, wolves, horses, minotaurs, and other animals. Marius abolished the use of all of these except the eagle, which survived as the typical emblem of the Roman armies, and their "conquering eagles" became an ordinary form of expression.

Pancirollus, in his history of things known to the ancients whose use has been lost to the moderns, states that the standards of the cavalry were square pieces of cloth of a sky-blue color, held aloft on the top of spears; the color being in honor of the god Neptune, who was fabled to have introduced the knowledge of the use of horses. The infantry carried a banner, "the color of a rose, because that flower springeth out of the earth and hath a fragrant smell.' The application of this latter attribution does not seem entirely clear, for it is not at all likely that a battalion of modern infantry, after "springing out of the earth," either from a battle or a march, would resemble the attar of roses.

"According to Dio Cassius," continues Pancirollus, 'some of these standards were four square of silver or gold, and were carried usually in an outer case of wood, to protect them from the effects of the weather. This was first invented by Caius Marius, and was afterwards used for the armies of the empire." Under the Roman Emperors the standards received ornamentation of various kinds, dragons, silver balls, &c. Some of the standards are two right hands joined, in token of amity and concord in an army; a type which occurs not infrequently upon the imperial coinage.

The most famous, however, of all the Roman standards was the Labarum,* a word whose derivation has hitherto puzzled all researches; efforts have been made, but in vain, to connect it with all the known languages of the world. The standard itself was a long pike, intersected by a "transversal beam, from which hung down a silken veil curiously inwrought with the image of the reigning monarch and his children. The summit of the pike supported a crown of gold, which enclosed the mysterious monogram (Chi-Rho.) at once expressive of the figure of the cross and of the initial letters of the name of Christ. The custody of the Labarum was entrusted to a guard of fifty picked men,"† and to the banner itself a superstitious reverence was attached, growing out of its alleged divine origin. According to the story, Christ came to Constantine in a vision, after the appearance of the miraculous cross in the heavens, and ordered him to cause to be prepared a standard in imitation of the one which he had seen; that he should use it as a protection in his engagements with his enemies; that under its influence he should always be victorious. As soon as the day had dawned the Emperor arose and declared the vision that had manifested itself, and in obedience to its mandate he called together workers in gold and precious stones, and ordered them to fashion a banner patterned upon the description of the dream-sent standard.

So long as the Emperors of the East took the field themselves, the Labarum always accompanied them, but when, in later days, the monarchs of Constantinople became effeminate, the banner was put away, (to moulder as useless lumber,) in some one of the disused rooms of the palace.

Of all the species of ensigns and standards which were in use among the Romans, abundant examples have survived to the present day upon their coinage, the mere enumeration of which fills twelve quarto columns of Gusseme's Diccionario. Even then the learned author is forced to say, Confieso que no es posible apurar todas las medallas en que se encuentran signos militares; porque es muy dilatado su nombre. [That it is not possible to give the details of all the coins upon which military ensigns are figured, as their number is so extensive.]

A FRENCH antiquary has found the most ancient bronze statue known, in the collection of Egyptian antiquities recently gathered by M. Gustave Posno. It is almost identical in feature and workmanship with the famous sycamore wood statue in the Museum of Boulac, the port of Cairo, and which is contemporary with the fourth Egyptian dynasty — a period of some 3000 years before the Christian era.

* "Labarum, derived from Labar, i. e., Insignia Lunaria, from the lunette upon them. They consisted of a crescent, of a disk of metal, and of a chaplet of olive or laurel. The name was borrowed from some of the conquered nations, who had the same kind of military standard.”. Bryant Mythol., Vol. 3, p. 327, edit., 1807.

Eusebius, Vit. Constant. cited in Gibbon.

THE PROFIT OF COLLECTING.

WE take the following article from a recent number of The Art Amateur, as showing the advantages of collecting from a somewhat different point of view than that from which the Journal has advocated it, but none the less one which may well be considered. EDS.

THERE is conceded to be much pleasure in collecting rare books, fine paintings, old coins, and other treasures, but it is not so generally perceived that such collecting is often a cheap pleasure and very profitable to the collector himself in some instances, and, more frequently, to his heirs. W. J. Loftie, an English art writer, gives some curious examples of this. For instance, the late Mr. Gillott, the steel-pen maker of Birmingham, was a famous collector of paintings. He began, as soon as he had the money, to buy a picture or two every year from some rising artist. He trusted, it is said, his own judgment, which implies that he had judgment to trust. He enjoyed the possession of the pictures very much. They were a constant source of intense pleasure to him. He was rather an illiterate man, not having had the advantages of education in his youth. His great resource was in his picture gallery, and it was a cheap pleasure. The fact is, it cost him nothing. When it was dispersed, after his death, there were not wanting people to assert that the increase in the value of the pictures since they were painted was such as to bring in to Mr. Gillott's heirs a sum equal to the aggregate produce at 20 per cent. per annum of all the money he spent. And it is curious further to observe that the pictures which Mr. Gillott had bought at the highest prices fetched less at his sale than those he had given the least money for. The Ettys, the Maclises, the Wilsons, which formed, as he probably thought, the great features of his gallery, fetched nothing in comparison with the Turner water-colors and the Mullers, for which comparatively he had given very little.

suit.

But let us take a less prominent case, as more illustrative of the position, that collecting may be a cheap pleasure. A man with a taste for early printed books, and with a knowledge of the history of the art, goes into an auction room or a bookseller's every now and then as he passes by on his daily road to business. Sometimes he sees a rare book going for a low price, and he buys it. More often he has to be content while others buy who are wealthier, but he learns something regarding the comparative value and rarity of particular books. He derives a vast amount of enjoyment from his purHe meets intellectual men on common ground. He has a little wholesome . excitement now and then at a sale. And he has the quiet pleasure of collating his treasures of an evening, of mending them, of binding them, perhaps of making one perfect whole from several fragments. He learns a great deal, and that too of a useful kind, and though he often has to walk or go in an omnibus rather than take a cab, he does not mind it. The taste, the consciousness that he has something behind the daily routine of business life, is worth much to him, and meanwhile he is steadily gathering a collection. All those cab drives he does not take, all those newspapers and magazines he does not buy, all those cigars he does not smoke, all those club luncheons he does not eat, all those coats, hats, hose, and other garments he does well without, have gone to increase the collection. Had he bought all these things he would have none of them to leave; but the mere chips and parings of ordinary life have given him enough to form a good, if a small collection, and at his death, or before it, they are sold for such a sum as will materially add to the resources of his family. This all goes to show that a very small expenditure on worthy objects of art is both good and pleasant in itself, and also a prudent piece of economy. Let us take one more example from Mr. Loftie's experience. The facts of it, he says, are true, but one or two particulars, of no importance to the matter in hand, are varied, as many of the actors in the story are still alive.

About forty years ago, an English country baronet of moderate wealth married for the second time. His only son did not get on with his stepmother. He was wild, and would not be restrained. She had a large family in the course of time; and the stepson, having gone on from bad to worse, died in miserable circumstances, into which we

need not pry farther than to say that, immediately after his death, the old baronet had a letter acquainting him with the fact that his son had married just before his death, and that the widow hoped shortly to present him with a grand-child.

Knowing, as he too well did, the kind of female company into which his prodigal son habitually entered, the old man was terribly shocked at the news. His second wife's eldest boy was a good lad, and was likely to be a comfort to himself and a credit to his family. But if this woman should have a son, then all would go into her control, and the result probably would be the utter ruin of his ancient family. So much did these apprehensions distress him that he died a very few months after his eldest son. Almost at the same time the widow wrote to say that she was the mother of a boy. The consternation in the family may be imagined. The young mother had taken care to provide for all possible contingencies. There were witnesses to the marriage and to everything. And though the witnesses chiefly belonged to the same class as the lady herself, their testimony was not thereby invalidated.

At first the young uncle and his mother endeavored to do what they could to draw the heir and his mother to them, and, promising to forget all past errors, offered to receive her into the family, and to make no opposition to the child's succession. But before very long curious rumors reached them. They made inquiries, which were attended with great expense, and led to nothing. By degrees, however, one little circumstance after another accumulated till they were able to take a decisive step. They boldly challenged the paternity of the child, and refused to acknowledge it or its mother.

Legal proof was still difficult to obtain. It was obtained at last, however, and by a mere accident. The child was proved to be the offspring of a washer-woman; and though the marriage was never called in question, it is said that the witnesses to it were no more to be believed than those who testified to the birth of the false heir.

A more romantic story has seldom been told in the law courts. The general public were greatly entertained. But the bill had to be paid, and of that the public knew nothing. A great deal of money had been spent or was owed, and the new baronet's success seemed to have been purchased at a cost which would keep him poor all his life.

But it so happened that shortly after these events a man of taste, who was well acquainted with certain branches of art and archæology, was staying in the house. And one day the unfortunate young heir showed him a great boxful of old curiosities - coins, let us say. "They were gathered by my great-grand-father, and are of all ages and kinds. Do you think they would be worth selling? They did not cost much, for my ancestor never had much money to spend." The connoisseur looked over them for a few minutes. There were a great number, most of them worthless. But presently he jumped up with an exclamation. "This must be a forgery," he cried. "The only known example is in the Museum; they gave a thousand pounds for it, and it should be worth more now." He had two or three more surprises, and finally determined to take the whole boxful to town and show them to an expert.

When the box of coins had been thoroughly ransacked, about four hundred were found to be of great value. Of these two hundred were at once bought for a great public collection at an immense price, as it seemed to their owner, and the rest were sent to a saleroom. There they brought such a sum as, added to that obtained from the Museum, paid off all the costs of the lawsuit, and enabled the young baronet to start in life out of debt from that cause at least. From this may be drawn the safe moral that if you collect what may seem common enough now, a few years hence your grandchildren may have cause to bless you.

Art Amateur, N. Y.

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"A FRESH coin was a kind of a Gazette, that published the latest news of the Empire. But where statesmen are ruled by a spirit of faction and interest, they can have no passion for the glory of their country, nor any concern for the figure it will make among posterity."— Addison.

THERE is not a single science that might not furnish a man with business for life, though it were much longer than it is.

THE collector is one who forms "Habits for occupying the idle hour, and interesting the vacant mind."

DATES OF CONSULAR OR FAMILY COINS.

ONE of the first inquiries made by an amateur collector, when a new coin is placed in his hands, is directed to its age. But this is the very question, when applied to Consular or Family coins that is the most difficult to answer. Consular coins were struck first in honor of the Consuls, (as the writings of the Romans testify,) by the triumvirs of monetary affairs, A. V. C. CCCCLXXXIV (B. C. 269). That is, the oldest Consular or Family coin cannot be more than 2149 years of age. So says the numismatic scholar Rasche, basing his statement upon the well known fact that the first silver coinage of Rome was struck B. C. 268, and that the first silver money was Consular.

It was formerly considered that these coins were issued by the successive Consuls, and bore their names; but there are too many names in the series to bear out this theory. In every cabinet, says one writer, are numerous coins, having names of those who never held the consular dignity. The principal figure on the coin in Consular, and in fact all very ancient Roman money, is the image of the genius of Rome (Pallas), wearing a helmet, or of some other deity tutelar to the particular family named on the coin, placed upon it by the mint masters for the purpose of perpetuating the honor of that family. So with those coins which contain the effigies of Romulus, or of the succeeding kings, or of Scipio, Lucullus, Regulus, Metellus, and others, they were struck by their successors, the triumvirs, (the coins being made and marked A A A FF) that they might set forth the lasting honor and glory of their ancestors or the ancient family and nobility of themselves.

This was done by Augustus, Vespasian, Domitian, and others. The explanation of A A A F F (Auro, Argento, Aere, Flando, Feriundo,) is sufficiently understood by all collectors: "For making the blanks, (flans, buttons, planchets or unstruck discs) which by striking were to become gold, silver and copper money."

When the Roman Republic faded away, the faces of Julius Caesar and the other triumvirs first began to appear upon the coins, and also their armed effigies, clothed sometimes in the paludamentum, or military cloak, and sometimes in the toga.

On the reverse of the most ancient Consular coins the prow of a vessel is conspicuous, or Castor and Pollux as horsemen, or Victory drawn in a chariot, sometimes having two and sometimes four horses. But afterwards, when the memory of the illustrious deeds and honors of the ancestors had been transmitted to the descendants, the moneyers (mint-masters, triumviri monetales,) impressed upon the reverses of the coins the insignia of magistrates, and the evidences of triumphs enjoyed, and finally the pontifical insignia.

As a general rule there is no difficulty in designating a Consular (or Family) coin, but, as remarked at first, an insuperable difficulty in dating it. Much the larger part of them seem to have been struck within the half century previous to the enthronement of Augustus (say from B. C. 80 to B. C. 30). One author suggests that during the Republic any officer in charge of a newly subjugated province had the privilege of coining money bearing his