AR22 - Antoninus Pius L Κ

Year 20 of Antoninus Pius's reign — the regnal year denoted by the L Κ in the type designation — places this issue squarely within a period of administrative stability in Roman Egypt that was, by the standards of the province, almost uneventful. Alexandria's billon tetradrachms of this period were struck in a debased silver alloy controlled by the imperial government, which maintained a deliberate monopoly on Egyptian coinage: foreign silver was confiscated at the border and exchanged for local issues, keeping the provincial currency entirely captive to Rome's monetary policy for Egypt.