Denarius - Julius Caesar CAESAR•IMP / P•SEPVLLIVS MACER

Struck in the final weeks of Caesar's life, this issue was produced under the moneyer Publius Sepullius Macer in early 44 BC — after the Senate had granted Caesar the title of perpetual dictator in February of that year. The coin is historically explosive: it places Caesar's portrait on a Roman republican denarius while he still breathed, a break with centuries of convention that reserved living portraiture for foreign kings. It almost certainly contributed to the climate that produced the Ides of March.

Macer struck at least two related types in this period; RRC 480/5 is distinguished from 480/6 by the reverse type rather than die variation proper. Examples circulated briefly before the post-assassination chaos effectively pulled them from active use.