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| Issuer | Smyrna (Conventus of Smyrna) |
|---|---|
| Year | 54-59 |
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| Composition | Log in to see details |
| Weight | 5.27 g |
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| Obverse description | Log in to see details |
|---|---|
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| Reverse description | Nemesis standing in three-quarter view, turned to the right, holding a caduceus in her right hand; a serpent coils before her in the field to her left. The goddess is rendered in the Hellenistic civic tradition typical of Ionian bronze coinage, with the magistrate's name and civic ethnic distributed in the surrounding legend. The composition fills the flan with confident die-cutting characteristic of Smyrnaean civic issues under the early Empire. |
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| Reverse lettering | ΑΥ ΓΕΣΣΙΟΣ ΦΙΛΟΠΑΤΡΙΣ ΖΜΥ(Ρ) |
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| Additional information |
Gessius Philopatris served as the Roman magistrate responsible for this civic bronze issue from Smyrna during the earliest years of Nero's reign, before the emperor's public image had deteriorated under Seneca and Burrus's increasingly strained influence. Provincial cities like Smyrna competed aggressively within the Conventus system for Roman favor, and naming a local magistrate prominently on coinage was a calculated act of civic self-promotion directed as much at the governor's office as at any local audience. The abbreviation ΖΜ likely denotes a civic tribe or administrative subdivision within Smyrna's internal organization.