Collecting Ancient Roman Coins

For an affordable piece of history, consider collecting ancient Roman coins. Ancient Roman coins differ from ancient Greek coins in that the Romans placed images of their rulers on their coins. The Greeks shunned the use of real people as images on their coins. In addition, ancient Roman coins tell much more of a direct story about their creators; military victories and important events became inspirations for creating coins – sometimes as propaganda pieces. Popular ancient Roman coins include Brutus’ “Ides of March”, the coins of the twelve Caesars, and the “JVDEA CAPTA” coins commemorating Emperor Vespasian’s victory over the Jews during 70 A.D. To start, you can find small copper coins for under $5 a piece. For a silver denarius, the Roman penny, you can expect to pay from $20 to $50.