Constantius I ‘Chlorus’ as Caesar 302AD Rare Ancient Roman Coin Genius i51065

Constantius I
 ‘Chlorus’ 
–
Roman Emperor
: 305-306 
A.D.
 Bronze Follis 25mm (7.88 grams) Lugdunum mint: 302-304 A.D.
Reference: RIC 164a (VI, Lugdunum)
CONSTANTIVSNOBC – Laureate, cuirassed bust right.
 GENIOPOPVLIROMANI Exe: B/PLG – Genius standing left, sacrificing over 
altar and
holding cornucopia.

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The cornucopia (from Latin cornu copiae) 
or horn of plenty is a symbol of abundance and 
nourishment, commonly a large horn-shaped container 
overflowing with produce, flowers, nuts, other edibles, 
or wealth in some form. Originating in
classical antiquity
, it 
has continued as a symbol in
Western art
, and it is 
particularly associated with the
Thanksgiving
holiday in
North America
.

Allegorical
depiction of the Roman goddess
Abundantia
with a cornucopia, by
Rubens
(ca. 
1630)

In 
Mythology

Mythology
offers 
multiple
explanations of the origin
of the cornucopia. One of the best-known involves the 
birth and nurturance of the infant
Zeus
, who had to be 
hidden from his devouring father
Cronus
. In a cave on
Mount Ida
on the island 
of
Crete
, baby Zeus was 
cared for and protected by a number of divine 
attendants, including the goat
Amalthea
(“Nourishing 
Goddess”), who fed him with her milk. The suckling 
future king of the gods had unusual abilities and 
strength, and in playing with his nursemaid accidentally 
broke off one of her
horns
, which then had 
the divine power to provide unending nourishment, as the 
foster mother had to the god.

In another myth, the cornucopia was created when
Heracles
(Roman
Hercules
) wrestled with 
the river god
Achelous
and wrenched 
off one of his horns; river gods were sometimes depicted 
as horned. This version is represented in the
Achelous and Hercules

mural painting
by the
American Regionalist
artist
Thomas Hart Benton
.

The cornucopia became the attribute of several
Greek
and
Roman deities
, 
particularly those associated with the harvest, 
prosperity, or spiritual abundance, such as 
personifications of Earth (Gaia 
or
Terra
); the child
Plutus
, god of riches 
and son of the grain goddess
Demeter
; the
nymph
Maia
; and
Fortuna
, the goddess of 
luck, who had the power to grant prosperity. In
Roman Imperial cult
, 
abstract Roman deities who fostered peace (pax 
Romana) and prosperity were also depicted 
with a cornucopia, including
Abundantia
, “Abundance” 
personified, and
Annona
, goddess of the
grain supply to the city of Rome
.
Pluto
, the classical 
ruler of the underworld in the
mystery religions
, was 
a giver of agricultural, mineral and spiritual wealth, 
and in art often holds a cornucopia to distinguish him 
from the gloomier
Hades
, who holds a
drinking horn
instead.

Modern depictions

In modern depictions, the cornucopia is typically a 
hollow, horn-shaped wicker basket filled with various 
kinds of festive
fruit
and
vegetables
. In North 
America, the cornucopia has come to be associated with
Thanksgiving
and the 
harvest. Cornucopia is also the name of the annual 
November Wine and Food celebration in
Whistler
, British 
Columbia, Canada. Two cornucopias are seen in the
flag
and
state seal
of
Idaho
. The Great
Seal
of
North Carolina
depicts 
Liberty standing and Plenty holding a cornucopia. The 
coat of arms of
Colombia
,
Panama
,
Peru
and
Venezuela
, and the Coat 
of Arms of the State of
Victoria, Australia
, 
also feature the cornucopia, symbolising prosperity.

The horn of plenty is used on body art and at 
Halloween, as it is a symbol of fertility, fortune and 
abundance.

• 

  Base of a statue of
  Louis XV of France

In
ancient Roman religion
, 
the genius was the individual instance of a 
general divine nature that is present in every 
individual person, place, or thing.

 

Winged genius facing a woman with a 
tambourine and mirror, from southern Italy, 
about 320 BC.

Nature of the genius

The rational powers and abilities of every human 
being were attributed to their soul, which was a
genius. Each individual place had a genius (genius 
loci) and so did powerful objects, such 
as volcanoes. The concept extended to some specifics: 
the genius of the theatre, of vineyards, and of 
festivals, which made performances successful, grapes 
grow, and celebrations succeed, respectively. It was 
extremely important in the Roman mind to propitiate the 
appropriate genii for the major undertakings and events 
of their lives.

Specific genii

 

Bronze genius depicted as
pater familias
 
(1st century CE)

Although the term genius might apply to any 
divinity whatsoever, most of the higher-level and state
genii had their own well-established names.
Genius applied most often to individual places or 
people not generally known; that is, to the smallest 
units of society and settlements, families and their 
homes. Houses, doors, gates, streets, districts, tribes, 
each one had its own genius.The supreme hierarchy 
of the Roman gods, like that of the Greeks, was modelled 
after a human family. It featured a father,
Jupiter
(“father god”), 
who, in a
patriarchal society
was 
also the supreme divine unity, and a mother,
Juno
, queen of the 
gods. These supreme unities were subdivided into
genii for each individual family; hence, the
genius of each female, representing the female 
domestic reproductive power, was a Juno. The male 
function was a Jupiter.

The juno was worshipped under many titles:

• Iugalis, “of marriage”
• Matronalis, “of married women”
• Pronuba, “of brides”
• Virginalis, “of virginity”

Genii were often viewed as protective spirits, 
as one would propitiate them for protection. For 
example, to protect infants one propitiated a number of
deities concerned with birth and 
childrearing
: Cuba (“lying down to 
sleep”), Cunina (“of the cradle”) and Rumina 
(“of breast-feeding”). Certainly, if those genii 
did not perform their proper function well, the infant 
would be in danger.

Hundreds of lararia, or family shrines, have 
been discovered at
Pompeii
, typically off 
the
atrium
, kitchen or 
garden, where the smoke of burnt offerings could vent 
through the opening in the roof. A lararium was 
distinct from the penus (“within”), another 
shrine where the
penates
, gods 
associated with the storerooms, was located. Each
lararium features a panel fresco containing the same 
theme: two peripheral figures (Lares) 
attend on a central figure (family genius) or two 
figures (genius and Juno) who may or may 
not be at an altar. In the foreground is one or two 
serpents crawling toward the genius through a 
meadow motif.
Campania
and
Calabria
preserved an 
ancient practice of keeping a propitious house snake, 
here linked with the genius. In another, 
unrelated fresco (House 
of the Centenary) the snake-in-meadow appears 
below a depiction of
Mount Vesuvius
and is 
labelled Agathodaimon, “good
daimon
“, where
daimon must be regarded as the Greek equivalent of
genius.

History of the concept

Origin

Etymologically
genius
(“household 
guardian spirit”) has the same derivation as nature 
from
gēns
(“tribe”, 
“people”) from the
Indo-European
root 
*gen-, “produce.”
It is the indwelling nature of an 
object or class of objects or events that act with a 
perceived or hypothesized unity. Philosophically the 
Romans did not find the paradox of the one being many 
confusing; like all other prodigies they attributed it 
to the inexplicable mystery of divinity. Multiple events 
could therefore be attributed to the same and different 
divinities and a person could be the same as and 
different from his genius. They were not 
distinct, as the later guardian angels, and yet the
Genius Augusti was not exactly the same as
Augustus either. As a natural outcome of these 
beliefs, the pleasantness of a place, the strength of an 
oath, an ability of a person, were regarded as intrinsic 
to the object, and yet were all attributable to
genius; hence all of the modern meanings of the 
word. This point of view is not attributable to any one 
civilization; its roots are lost in prehistory. The 
Etruscans had such beliefs at the beginning of history, 
but then so did the Greeks, the native Italics and many 
other peoples in the near and middle east.

Genii under the monarchy

No literature of the monarchy has survived, but later 
authors in recounting its legends mention the genius. 
For example, under
Servius Tullius
the 
triplets
Horatii
of Rome fought 
the triplets Curiatii of
Alba Longa
for the 
decision of the war that had arisen between the two 
communities. Horatius was left standing but his sister, 
who had been betrothed to one of the Curiatii, began to 
keen, breast-beat and berate Horatius. He executed her, 
was tried for murder, was acquitted by the Roman people 
but the king made him expiate the Juno of his sister and 
the Genius Curiatii, a family genius.

Republican genii

The genius appears explicitly in Roman 
literature relatively late as early as
Plautus
, where one 
character in the play,
Captivi
, jests that 
the father of another is so avaricious that he uses 
cheap Samian ware in sacrifices to his own genius, 
so as not to tempt the genius to steal it.In this 
passage, the genius is not identical to the 
person, as to propitiate oneself would be absurd, and 
yet the genius also has the avarice of the 
person; that is, the same character, the implication 
being, like person, like genius.

Implied geniuses date to much earlier; for example, 
when
Horatius Cocles
defends 
the
Pons Sublicius
against 
an Etruscan crossing at the beginning of the
Roman Republic
, after 
the bridge is cut down he prays to the Tiber to bear him 
up as he swims across: Tiberine pater te, sancte, 
precor …, “Holy father Tiber, I pray to you ….” 
The Tiber so addressed is a genius. Although the 
word is not used here, in later literature it is 
identified as one.
Horace
 
describes the genius as “the companion which controls 
the natal star; the god of human nature, in that he is 
mortal for each person, with a changing expression, 
white or black”.

Imperial genii

 

Genius of Domitian

Octavius Caesar
on 
return to Rome after the final victory of the
Roman Civil War
at the
Battle of Actium
appeared to the Senate to be a man of great power and 
success, clearly a mark of divinity. In recognition of 
the prodigy they voted that all banquets should include 
a libation to his genius. In concession to this 
sentiment he chose the name
Augustus
, capturing the 
numinous meaning of English “august.” This line of 
thought was probably behind the later vote in 30 BC that 
he was divine, as the household cult of the Genius 
Augusti dates from that time. It was propitiated at 
every meal along with the other household numina.The 
vote began the tradition of the
divine emperors
; 
however, the divinity went with the office and not the 
man. The Roman emperors gave ample evidence that they 
personally were neither immortal nor divine.

 

Inscription on votive altar to the genius 
of
Legio VII Gemina
by L. Attius Macro (CIL 
II 5083)

If the
genius
of the
imperator
, or 
commander of all troops, was to be propitiated, so was 
that of all the units under his command. The provincial 
troops expanded the idea of the genii of state; 
for example, from Roman Britain have been found altars 
to the genii of Roma, Roman aeterna,
Britannia, and to every
legion
,
cohors
,
ala
and
centuria
in 
Britain, as well as to the
praetorium
of every

castra
and even to 
the
vexillae
. 
Inscriptional dedications to genius were not 
confined to the military. From
Gallia Cisalpina
under 
the empire are numerous dedications to the genii 
of persons of authority and respect; in addition to the 
emperor’s genius principis, were the geniuses of 
patrons of freedmen, owners of slaves, patrons of 
guilds, philanthropists, officials, villages, other 
divinities, relatives and friends. Sometimes the 
dedication is combined with other words, such as “to the 
genius and honor” or in the case of couples, “to the 
genius and Juno.”

Surviving from the time of the empire hundreds of 
dedicatory, votive and sepulchral inscriptions ranging 
over the entire territory testify to a floruit of
genius worship as an official cult. Stock phrases 
were abbreviated: GPR, genio populi Romani (“to 
the genius of the Roman people”); GHL, genio huius 
loci (“to the genius of this place”); GDN, genio 
domini nostri (“to the genius of our master”), and 
so on. In 392 AD with the final victory of Christianity
Theodosius I
declared 
the worship of the Genii,
Lares
and
Penates
to be treason, 
ending their official terms. The concept, however, 
continued in representation and speech under different 
names or with accepted modifications.

Roman iconography

Coins

The genius of a corporate social body is often 
a
cameo
theme on ancient 
coins: a
denarius
from Spain, 
76-75 BC, featuring a bust of the GPR (Genius 
Populi Romani, “Genius of the Roman People”) on the
obverse
; an
aureus
of
Siscia
in
Croatia
, 270-275 AD, 
featuring a standing image of the GENIUS ILLVR (Genius 
Exercitus Illyriciani, “Genius of the Illyrian 
Army”) on the reverse; an
aureus
of Rome, 134-138 
AD, with an image of a youth holding a cornucopia and 
patera (sacrificial dish) and the inscription GENIOPR,
genio populi Romani, “to the genius of the Roman 
people,” on the reverse.

Scene from Lararium, House of Iulius  Polybius, Pompeii  Agathodaimon (“good divinity”), genius of the  soil around Vesuvius  Unknown Roman genius near Pompeii,  1st century BC  Genius of Augustus   Genius of Antoninus Pius

Modern-era representations

Genius of love, Meister des  Rosenromans, 1420-1430  Genius of victory, Michelangelo (1475-1564  Genius of Palermo ,  Ignazio Marabitti, c. 1778  Genius of liberty, Augustin  Dumont , 1801-1884  Genius of Alexander, Marie Louise  Elisabeth Vigée-Lebrun, 1814  Genius of war, Arturo Melida y  Alinara (1849-1902)  Genius of Beethoven

Flavius Valerius Constantius/b> 
(March 31 c. 250 – July 25, 306), also Constantius I, 
was an
emperor
of the
Western Roman Empire
(305-306). He was commonly 
called Chlorus (the Pale) 
an epithet given to him by
Byzantine
historians. He was the father of
Constantine the Great
and initiator of the
Constantinian dynasty
.

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