Æ23 - Gallienus (sole reign) (ΤΙΜΕΛΗϹ ΑΦΡΟΔΙϹΙΕΩΝ)

Aphrodisias held an unusually privileged relationship with Rome — the city had been granted formal freedom and tax immunity by Augustus, a status it jealously maintained and periodically renegotiated well into the imperial period. Local bronze issues like this one were struck under civic authority rather than imperial directive, with the magistrate's title ΤΙΜΕΛΗϹ (roughly equivalent to a censor) named explicitly as issuing authority. That administrative specificity is what makes provincial bronzes from Aphrodisias useful historical documents.

Gallienus's sole reign followed the catastrophic capture of his father Valerian by Shapur I in 260 AD — the first Roman emperor taken prisoner in battle.