Constans, as Caesar, 333-337. Solidus (Gold, 21 mm, 4.69 g, 12 h), Constantinopolis, late 335-336. FL CONSTANS NOB CAES Laureate, draped and cuirassed bust of Constans to right. Rev. CONSTANS NOB CAESAR / CONS Victory advancing left, holding wreath in her right hand and palm frond in her left. Depeyrot 5/7. RIC 97. Rare and struck on an unusually heavy flan. A few tiny marks and small die breaks, otherwise, extremely fine.



Neither RIC nor Depeyrot comments on the conspicuously high weights displayed by some solidi of this issue - for example, the specimens from the Platt Hall Collection, Glendining (1950), 2039 (4.60 g), Naville 10 (2014), 235 (4.58 g) and Lucernae 24 (2024), 441 (4.62 g). Our coin, at 4.69 g, is heavier still and lies almost 5% above the average solidus weight of the period. This is remarkable, considering how strictly the weight of solidi was otherwise adjusted and controlled: an excess of this magnitude would have cost the state the equivalent of every twentieth solidus.