Silver Antoninianus of Trajan Decius

This portrait of Trajan Decius clearly shows the deep lines in his forehead. This realism in portraiture was a feature of Roman art during the later Republic and first two and a half centuries of the Empire. Starting in the middle of the Third Century, the artistic appraoch to portraiture changed from an unabashed realism to a very iconographic, stylized portraiture in the Fourth century and on into the Byzantine period.

Trajan Decius was a career, military man with the rough careworn face of an emperor - general who had grown old fighting too many battles against rebels and invaders. His coins were perhaps the last to attempt to portray stark facial features even if they weren't pretty. Later, coins of Probus would have beautiful and interesting obverse portraits, but these would highlight details of armour and weapons rather than accuracy of his face. Face portraits on coins had assumed a surreal, almost comical quality by the time of Probus' reign in A. D. 276.

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Emperor Trajan Decius Biographical and Historical Information.