- Choice Fine Empress Faustina Senior Roman Empire silver denarius coin.
- RIC 348, RSC 7, 3.54g, approx 18mm.
- Posthumous consecration issue, issued 138-140/1 AD by her devoted husband Emperor Antoninus Pius.
- Certified by NGC to Ch F Brushed (not distracting).
- Scarce and appealing veiled portrait of the Empress, very pleasing in hand.
- Obverse: DIVA FAVSTINA, veiled bust right.
- Reverse: AETERNITAS, Fortuna standing left holding globe & rudder.
- Fortuna was the goddess of fortune and the personification of luck in Roman religion.
- The Imperial cult of ancient Rome identified emperors and some members of their families with the divinely sanctioned authority (auctoritas) of the Roman State. Its framework was based on Roman and Greek precedents, and was formulated during the early Principate of Augustus. A deceased emperor held worthy of the honor could be voted a state divinity (divus, plural divi) by the Senate and elevated as such in an act of apotheosis. The granting of apotheosis served religious, political and moral judgment on Imperial rulers and allowed living Emperors to associate themselves with a well-regarded lineage of Imperial divi from which unpopular or unworthy predecessors were excluded.