Last night I was reading up on the Roman monetary system, and was reminded that a sestertius was 1/4 of a denarius. A denarius was abbreviated with an X; and a sestertius, unaccountably, with an HS. What the hell was that H? And I figured it out: it’s not an H, it’s IIS, i.e. II et semis, two and a half, a quarter of X. I’ve spent my whole life around Classicists and I never could get anyone to tell me what that meant, but I’m sure my guess here is right.
HS.
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This entry (permalink) was posted on Wednesday, May 5, 2010, at 2:21 pm by jbkuhner. Filed in Ancient History and tagged HS, Roman coinage, sesterce, sestertius.
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