Macrinus held power for just fourteen months before being defeated by the forces of Elagabalus at the Battle of Antioch in June 218 — making provincial bronzes struck in his name among the shortest-reigned issues of the Severan period. Ephesus was at this time asserting its title as ΠΡΩΤΗ ΤΗΣ ΑΣΙΑΣ, "first of Asia," a designation fiercely contested with Smyrna and Pergamon through a decades-long rivalry adjudicated by Rome itself.
The ΜΟΝΩΝ qualifier in the legend is pointed — it insists Ephesus held the primacy alone, a direct rebuttal to rival cities claiming shared or equal standing.
Macrinus held power for just fourteen months before being defeated by the forces of Elagabalus at the Battle of Antioch in June 218 — making provincial bronzes struck in his name among the shortest-reigned issues of the Severan period. Ephesus was at this time asserting its title as ΠΡΩΤΗ ΤΗΣ ΑΣΙΑΣ, "first of Asia," a designation fiercely contested with Smyrna and Pergamon through a decades-long rivalry adjudicated by Rome itself.
The ΜΟΝΩΝ qualifier in the legend is pointed — it insists Ephesus held the primacy alone, a direct rebuttal to rival cities claiming shared or equal standing.