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Semis - Juba I
| Issuer | Numidia |
|---|---|
| Year | 60 BC - 46 BC |
| Type | Standard circulation coin |
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| Obverse description | Draped bust of Numidia or Africa facing right, wearing a distinctive elephant-skin headdress, the trunk and ears of the beast rendered in raised relief above the brow. The drapery falls across the shoulder in folds, and the portrait is executed in a bold, somewhat provincial Hellenistic style characteristic of late Numidian royal coinage. The field is plain, with no encircling legend. The flan is irregular and the strike moderately centred, as typical of hammered issues of this period. |
|---|---|
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| Reverse description | A lion striding vigorously to the right, rendered in high relief with its maned head turned to face the viewer frontally, conveying a sense of power and regality emblematic of Numidian royal iconography. The musculature of the body is boldly modelled, with the tail raised and curving over the back. A Neo-Punic inscription arcs above the lion in the upper field, identifying the issuing authority. The design occupies the majority of the flan, with the reverse legend serving as the principal epigraphic element of this type. |
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| Additional information |
Juba I ruled Numidia through one of the most turbulent periods of the late Republic, ultimately backing Pompey and the senatorial faction against Caesar. After the defeat at Thapsus in 46 BC, he and Marcus Petreius reportedly agreed to a mutual suicide rather than face capture — the kingdom itself was absorbed into the new Roman province of Africa Nova almost immediately afterward. His bronze coinage thus has a hard terminal date fixed by military defeat and political annihilation, not administrative reform.