Ides of March The Republicans. Brutus, late summer-autumn 42 BC. Denarius (Silver, 19 mm, 3.41 g, 12 h), military mint travelling with Brutus and Cassius in western Asia Minor or northern Greece, under the moneyer L. Plaetorius Cestianus. BRVT IMP L• PLAET• CEST Bare head of Brutus to right. Rev. EID • MAR Pileus between two daggers pointing downwards. BMC 68 (same dies). Cahn, EIDibus MARtiis, 10b (same dies). Campana, Eid Mar 30-36 (O2/R10). Cohen 15. Crawford 508/3. CRI 216. RCV 1439 (same dies). Sydenham 1301. Very rare and of the greatest historical importance. Crystallized surfaces; flan crack, otherwise, very fine. When modern media outlets are tasked with illustrating the assassination of the best-known man in the entire ancient world, they usually fall back on this dramatic coin type, issued shortly after the deed. Already in antiquity, the coin depicting a cap of liberty flanked by daggers left a lasting mark, with the great historian Cassius Dio quite accurately describing it in his oeuvre more than 270 years later:[...] Brutus stamped upon the coins which were being minted his own likeness and a cap and two daggers, indicating by this and by the inscription that he and Cassius had liberated the fatherland (Cass. Dio 47, 25.3). Appian, a Roman historian working during the reign of Antoninus Pius, reports that the conspirators left the assembly after the murder, brandishing a pileus on a spear (App. Civ. 2, 119, 499), thus directly linking another stylistic element on the coin's reverse to the momentous act. It is noteworthy that the pommels of the daggers are different, making them individual weapons traditionally ascribed to the two leaders, Brutus and Cassius. In 2003, B. Woytek demonstrated that, based on our sources, it unfortunately remains unclear where and when exactly this coin type was minted. The best we can do is narrow the options down to late summer and autumn of 42 BC, in either Asia Minor or Northern Greece. Recently, it has been argued convincingly by S. Günther that Brutus's EID MAR coins were more than payment or a donative: by putting the image of the liberty cap directly into his soldiers' hands, along with his own portrait and a reference to his cause, he tried to forge a deeper, almost tangible bond of loyalty — not just a wage, but a constant physical reminder of the promise he was making them. A promise that went unfulfilled — one that many recipients of Brutus's donative would go on to pay for with their own lives. https://cdn.nomosag.com/auctions/95/video00334.mp4?sv=2023-01-03&ss=b&srt=co&st=2025-03-10T16%3A25%3A27Z&se=2099-03-11T16%3A25%3A00Z&sp=rl&sig=i7RzFAqwYGMJUp3u71BbRyL3HhIAtR%2F8cUnRnTVQfyU%3D&rsct=video%2Fmp4