Æ21 - Antoninus Pius ΚΥΖΙΚΗΝΩΝ (Ζ shaped as エ)

Cyzicus was one of the wealthiest cities in Roman Asia Minor, its civic coinage functioning as a municipal assertion of status within the conventus system — the regional judicial circuit through which Roman governors administered the province. The unusual Ζ form rendered with horizontal serifs resembling the Japanese katakana エ is not decorative caprice but a regional epigraphic convention attested in Mysian bronze issues, occasionally used to distinguish civic dies from those of neighboring mints competing for the same circulation zone.