AVG. = Augustus, an honorific personal name given to Octavian, assumed as a title by his successors.
CAES. = Caesar, the personal name of Julius Caesar and Octavian, assumed as a title by their non-hereditary successors; survives in modern times as Kaiser and Czar.
CENS.P(ER). = Censor Perpetuus = Censor in Perpetuity.
COS.III, IIII, etc. = Consul for the third, fourth time etc.
D.N. = Dominus Noster = Our Lord, a title conferred in the later Empire on the Augusti and the Caesars.
F. = Filius = Son; thus (e.g.) DIVI VESP(ASIANI) F. = Son of the Divine Vespasian.
IMP. = Imperator = Commander-in-Chief of the armed forces; usually at the beginning of a legend; to be distinguished from IMP., IMP.II, III etc. at the end, signifying a victorious army's acclamation of its commander.
P.F. = Pius, Felix = Dutiful, Fortunate/Successful, a common abbreviation on imperial medallions.
P.M. = Pontifex Maximus = Chief Priest of the Roman state religion, a title used to this day on papal coins.
P.P. = Pater Patriae = Father of his Country.
S.C. = Senatus Consulto = By Decree of the Senate.
S.P.Q.R. = Senatus Populusque Romanus = The Senate and the Roman People.
TR.P(OT). = Tribunicia Potestate = Holding Tribunician Power, the chief civil authority, a source of power and security, yet a much more palatable formula than the hated REX or DICTATOR; a Republican throwback.
Where legends are "telescoped", as often occurs on coins of the Roman Republic, they are, nevertheless, given in full in coin descriptions for the sake of clarity. Similarly, a dot is inserted after a letter or word of a legend to show that it is an abbreviation. No attempt is made to indicate the actual presence or absence of dots on the coin itself. Where desired, this can be ascertained from the reference cited. If a legend is partly obliterated, missing letters are supplied in square brackets.
MAXIMIAN HERCULIUS OBVERSES: P F OR P P?
D.S. Barrett
University of Queensland
Neither Cohen nor C.H.V. Sutherland lists any coins of Maximian Herculius (A.D. 286-305, 306-308) with P.P. in the obverse legend. Sutherland accepts P.F. as wholly standard: 'Oxford has a coin with obv. IMP.C.MAXIMIANVS P.P.AVG., apparently by error for - P.F. -.' Nor can P.P. be read clearly on any coins of the period illustrated in the catalogues of the Domqueur and Cher hoards.
On the other hand, M. Hammond clearly demonstrates that the title pater patriae was used by emperors as long as the Republican offices persisted, i.e. till the latter half of the fourth century A.D. The Ashmolean Museum has not just one, but at least four Maximian coins with P.P. on the obverse, and the University of Queensland Antiquities Museum has one. Cohen lists a small number of Maximian's coins with P.P. on the reverse, and so does Sutherland.
In short then, it seems that P.P. on Maximian obverses may well be regarded as a common variant for P.F. rather than a mintmaster's error.
(Reproduced from Seaby Coin and Medal Bulletin 747 (November, 1980), p. 348, by kind permission of the publishers.)