Roman Empire

Tiberius, Emperor AD 14-37

RIC 29; Lyon 153; ; BN 22; BMC 47; Calicó 305b, Mint State

‘Tribute Penny’ type. Lugdunum, AD 36/7. TI CAESAR DIVI AVG F AVGVSTVS, laureate head of Tiberius right. Reverse: PONTIF MAXIM, Livia, as Pax, seated right, holding scepter and olive branch, resting feet on footstool; ornate chair legs, single line below.

Upon the death of Augustus in AD 14, he was succeeded by his stepson, Tiberius, who had never been his preferred successor. Tiberius earned a place for himself in the annals of infamy for his increasingly autocratic style of rule and his use of maiestas trials that terrorized the Senate. In AD 27, he retired to the island of Capreae and left much of the administration in the hands of the Praetorian Prefect Sejanus, who attempted to concentrate power in his own hands. He was finally overthrown in AD 31, but a purge of his colleagues continued until the death of Tiberius in AD 37. Rome was happy to be rid of both, but the power that accrued to the Praetorian Guard under Tiberius would later have dire consequences for imperial power, especially in the third century.