169, Lot: 154. Estimate $100. Sold for $411. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

Ti. Veturius. 137 BC. AR Denarius (20mm, 3.98 g). Helmeted and draped bust of Mars right / Youth kneeling left, looking right, between two warriors, each holding a spear, who touch with their swords a pig which the youth holds. Crawford 234/1; Sydenham 527a; Veturia 1. VF.

The denarius of Ti. Veturius is the first to break with the traditional charioteer type. The oath-taking scene relates to one of Rome’s most traumatic defeats, in 321 BC during the second Samnite War. The Roman army, marching to relieve the siege of Luceria was trapped in the defile of the Caudine Forks, and faced extermination by the Samnians holding the high ground. The two consuls commanding the army, Ti. Vetruius Calvinus and Sp. Postumius, agreed to surrender and the sponsio or sacrifice of a pig, was a sacred oath to abide by the terms of the surrender. When the two consul returned to Rome they declared that Rome and rest of the army was not bound by the agreement, since it was not a formal treaty, and they would surrender themselves to the Samnites as oath-breakers and allow Rome to pursue the war.