Quadrans - Augustus EX D D IIII VIR

Carteia, a Roman colony on the Bay of Gibraltar founded in 171 BC, was one of the few Hispanic cities granted the right to strike its own bronze coinage under Augustus. The EX D D formula — ex decreto decurionum, "by decree of the town council" — marks this as a civic issue authorized locally rather than imposed from Rome, a meaningful administrative distinction in the early Principate when Augustus was still calibrating which communities retained what autonomy.

The IIII VIR notation identifies the four magistrates who oversaw this emission, a collegiate structure characteristic of Roman colonial governance in Hispania Ulterior Baetica.