Livineia, a plebian family, whose surnames on coins are Regulus and Gallus. Its medals present thirteen varieties; extremely rare in gold; somewhat common in silver, except those pieces restored by Trajan: the third brass of this family are by the moneyers of Augustus, and are common.
The following are among the few interesting denarii of the Livineia family:
- L REGVLVS PR, the bare head of a young man with no beard / REGVLVS F PRAEF VR, a curule chair, upon which is a crown; on each side are the faces without axes.
- Same obverse / Two men, with spears, fighting with a lion, a tiger, and a bull; L REGVLVS in exergue.
The portrait on the obverse of these coins is certainly intended to represent some one of the more ancient Reguli, but which of them in particular does not seem to be known. Havercamp thinks that the letters PR following REGVLVS should read Pater Reguli, because the on the reverse of the first coin we read REGVLVS Filius. Eckhel clearly proves, however, that there should be no point between the P and the R, as erroneously engraved in Morell, but that it should read PRaetor. He, moreover, entertains no doubt of the epigraph of the reverse reading REGVLVS Filius, meaning the son of Praetor Regulus. It is thus also on coins of the Valeria family that we read MESSAL F.
These coins, in the opinion of Haversamp, were struck by that L Regulus, who, as may be implied from the addition PRAEF VR, was one of the Praefects of the City, whom Julius Caesar, when he went to Spain, left at Rome (as Dion relates), and who assumed to themselves the jus lictorum et sallae curulis, as the coins of this Regulus seem to shew, unless perhaps the type in the above described denarii more correctly belongs to the Praetorship of Regulus the father, expecially as there are no axes (secures) to the faces; and we learn from Spanheim that such was the case with the faces of the praetores urbani. By the type of combat of men with wild beasts, the magnificent gladitorial shews, given by Julius Caesar, are probably indicated.