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Æ18 - Nero Antioch
| Issuer | Antioch on the Orontes |
|---|---|
| Year | 55-56 |
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| Shape | Round (irregular) |
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| Obverse description | Bare-headed bust of the emperor Nero facing left, rendered in the provincial style characteristic of the Antiochene mint. The portrait displays the youthful features associated with Nero's early reign, with a rounded jaw and short hair rendered in low relief. The field is plain, with no visible legend, consistent with the civic coinage of Antioch under Nero. The flan shows the irregular fabric typical of hammered provincial bronzes of the mid-first century AD. Surface patination is a deep reddish-brown with areas of olive-green encrustation. |
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| Mintage | ND (55-56) |
| Additional information |
Antioch was the third-largest city in the Roman Empire and served as the administrative capital of Syria, making its civic bronze issues politically charged in ways that small provincial mints rarely achieved. This piece dates to the very opening of Nero's reign, when the court of Burrus and Seneca was still managing imperial image-making with considerable care. Antiochene bronzes of this period circulated almost entirely within the Levantine commercial economy — they rarely traveled far, which partly explains why surviving examples tend to show concentrated, uneven wear rather than the smooth attrition of widely-traveled coinage.