chronogram

Extravagant device, fashionable during the late Roman Empire and in the Renaissance period, in which the date was indicated on an inscription by certain letters being written large. The reader had to rearrange the outstanding letters to form the date. Thus ‘ChrIstVs DVX; ergo trIVMphVs’ was stamped on a coin struck by Gustavus Adolphus in 1632 (MDCXVVVVII).