AR24 - Hadrian L Η

Year eight of Hadrian's reign coincided with his first grand tour of the eastern provinces — a journey that would eventually take him through Egypt in 130–131 AD, though he had not yet arrived at the time of this striking. Alexandria's mint was producing heavily during these years, in part to meet demand generated by Hadrian's extensive military retinue and the administrative costs of his itinerant court moving across the empire.

The billon tetradrachms of this mint are notoriously inconsistent in silver content across regnal years; year eight issues tend toward the higher end of fineness for the Hadrianic series.