Æ18 - Marcus Aurelius ΑΜΑϹΤΡΙΑΝΩΝ

Amastris, a coastal city on the Pontic shore of Bithynia, struck this bronze in the opening year of Marcus Aurelius's sole reign following the death of Antoninus Pius in March 161. Provincial civic bronzes of this period were issued under local authority with no imperial mint involvement — the city controlled the dies, the weight standard, and the timing. Amastris had long leveraged its status as a major Black Sea port to maintain an active civic coinage, and issues naming the city in the genitive — ΑΜΑϹΤΡΙΑΝΩΝ — are among the more consistently produced of the Pontic regional series.