Sale: CNG 73, Lot: 1049. Estimate $500.  Closing Date: Wednesday, 13 September 2006.  Sold For $500. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

Constantine IV Pogonatus. 668-685. Æ Follis (16.97 g, 6h). Constantinople mint, 4th officina. Struck circa 668-673. Helmeted facing bust, holding globus cruciger / Large M flanked by Heraclius and Tiberius, both holding globus cruciger; cross above; D//CON. DOC II 28d; MIB III 77; SB 1173. VF, heavy earthen patina, roughly cleaned. Rare.

From the Henry Chitwood Collection.

The dawn of the reign of Constantine IV saw the beginning of a brave attempt at coinage reform. Under the reign of his father, Constans II, the ubiquitous bronze follis had decayed into one of the most wretched coinages ever inflicted on a people. Constantine revalued the follis, making it fully equivalent to its ancestor—the first large bronze coin issued under Anastasius I almost two hundred years earlier. Constantine was able to maintain this heavy standard throughout his seventeen year reign, but the succession of Justinian II in 685 saw the immediate revocation of this reform, and the return of the shrunken, cut-down follis of yesteryear.