Æ32 - Valerian and Gallienus ΕΠΙ ϹΤΡ ΠΟ ΑΙ ϹΕΒΗΡΕΙΝΟΥ ΚΟΛΟΦΩ/ΝΙΩΝ

Colophon, one of the ancient Ionian cities that had long faded from political relevance by the third century AD, continued striking bronze coinage under the joint reign of Valerian I and his son Gallienus — one of the few father-son co-emperorship arrangements in Roman history. The strategos named in the legend, Popilius Severinus, was the presiding civic magistrate responsible for authorizing the issue, a detail that pins this coin to a specific administrative moment in an otherwise poorly-documented provincial mint.