A gold coin issued by Brutus and described as a “naked and shameless” celebration of the assassination of Julius Caesar has sold for £3.2 million, a record for an ancient coin.
The gold aureus, which depicts the daggers of Marcus Junius Brutus and his fellow assassin Cassius, with the inscription EID MAR — for the ides of March, the date of the murder — is one of only three of its kind known. The others are on long-term loan to the British Museum and in the collection of the German Federal Bank.
It was struck in the summer or autumn of 42BC by a military mint travelling with the forces of Brutus and Cassius shortly before their defeat by Mark Antony and Octavian at the
