Since about 280 BC the Roman Republic issued both cast and minted bronze coins. The cast bronzes showed goddesses, gods and heros on their obverses; the reverses bore a prora, the prow of a ship.
The cast bronze coins depicted, like this half litra, a goddess on their obverse. She can be regarded as either Roma, or Diana. The animal on the reverse can be attributed to both goddesses. Either one sees it as a wolf, in which case it stands for Dea Roma, the personification of the Roman state. Or one regards it as a hound; then it stands for Diana, the goddess of hunt.