[scrabblehack]

If the coin is stamped 146 B.C., it's probably a fake.

[Verginius Rufus]

Right--anything using Arabic numerals at that time would have to be a fake.

The date is from the name of the official (monetal or moneyer) C. Antestius. T.R.S. Broughton's Magistrates of the Roman Republic puts him between 137 and 134 B.C., but that work was published in 1952, and perhaps new information has come out since then to show that he was actually in office in 146 B.C.

[Ruy Dias de Bivar]

***If the coin is stamped 146 B.C., it's probably a fake. ***

It's legit if it's BCE.;-)

[InABunkerUnderSF]

Roman coins don't carry a date. In the case of Roman emperors they are dated by the inscriptions which were the political propaganda of the time. In the case of Republic coins they are dated by the style and the moneyer's name. Castor and Pollux on the back probably mean that the coins were struck as the pay for the legions. After that they would have circulated.

[SteveH]

Maybe the money was backdated to avoid the Roman IRS... ;-)