Æ22 - Trajan ΔΙΟϹ

The Koinon of Bithynia — the provincial assembly representing the cities of Bithynia and Pontus collectively — issued coins like this one partly to fund the imperial cult and partly to assert regional prestige within the Roman provincial system. Trajan was among the most actively celebrated emperors in the eastern provinces, and the Bithynian koinon produced a notably varied series in his honor. Pliny the Younger served as governor of Bithynia-Pontus under Trajan around 111–113 AD, and his famous correspondence with the emperor survives as the administrative record for exactly the period this coin was circulating.