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  [Image]                            Item Sold At Auction #7
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                  Web Product ID: 739
                  Estimate: $3,000.00
                  Final Sale Price: $2,227.50
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                  Denomination: Aureus
                  Grade: Good Fine
                  Reference: RIC I 94




  Vitellius & Lucius Vitellius. 69 AD. AV Aureus (6.88 gm). A VITELLIVS GERM IMP AVG TR
  P, laureate head of Vitellius right / L VITELLIVS COS III CENSOR, Lucius Vitellus
  seated left, togate, holding scepter. Nice Fine. Rare! Estimate $3,000.



  Aulus Vitellius was the son of Lucius Vitellius, a well-fed Senator who attained a
  reputation as a sycophant of the Emperor Claudius. Vitellius Senior is depicted
  seated to left on the reverse of this rare aureus issued by his son during his brief
  seven-month reign. Aulus inherited his father's appetites and then some--his youth
  was spent stuffing his face with every imaginable delicacy and running up exorbitant
  gambling debts.

  By the time the Emperor Galba appointed him Governor of Lower Germany, he'd exhausted
  his inheritance and was deeply in hock. The Legions of Germania Inferior, in a
  rebellious mood since the skinflint Galba had refused to pay them the customary
  donative, hailed Vitellius as Emperor. He accepted the purple, and received the
  support of influential moneylenders in Rome--the only chance they stood of getting
  their money back lay in placing the public treasury at Vitellius' disposal. The
  German Legions marched on Rome, defeating Galba's murderer and successor Otho at the
  First Battle of Cremona on April 15, 69 AD. Otho committed suicide a day later, and
  Rome had a new Emperor, the fourth in ten months.

  Vitellius treated his accession as an excuse to throw one long banquet, spending the
  equivalent of $2 billion on lavish entertainments over the next seven months. Even
  word that Vespasian, commander of three Legions in Judaea, had been proclaimed
  Emperor by his troops failed to interrupt the party. By acting decisively, Vitellius
  may have quelled the revolt; instead, the whole East declared for Vespasian, and the
  Danubian Legions staged a lightning invasion of Italy which caught the Vitellians
  completely off guard. Vitellius dithered as the enemy approached, at one point
  abdicating the throne in return for a guarantee of his and his family's safety.
  Unfortunately, his supporters forced him to retract the offer. Vespasian's legions
  easily fought their way into Rome. Vitellius was found alone in the Palace,
  whimpering that none of what had happened had been his fault. The soldiers dragged
  him through the streets, butchered him, and dumped his bloated carcass into the
  Tiber. It took Vespasian a decade of stringent, economical rule to repair the damage
  done by Vitellius and the other short-lived rulers of Rome's infamous Long Year.


Used by permission of CNG, www.historicalcoins.com