Æ33 - Caracalla ΑΜΙϹΟΥ ΕΛΕΥΘΕΡΑϹ ΕΤ ϹΜΗ

Amisus held the status of a free city — *eleuthera* — under Roman administration, a privilege it had negotiated and fiercely maintained since the time of Pompey's reorganization of Pontus in 65 BC. That autonomy allowed the city to mint bronze coinage on its own civic calendar, which is precisely what the ΕΤ ϹΜΗ date formula records: year 248 of the Amisean era, anchored to that Pompeian settlement. Caracalla's brief reign and violent end in April 217 makes issues from his final year geographically and chronologically tight.