AR27 - Caracalla ΔΗΜΑΡΧ ΕΞ ΥΠΑΤΟϹ ΤΟ Δ

Rhesaena was a Mesopotamian city that gained colonial status under Septimius Severus following his eastern campaigns of 197–198 AD, which wrested the region from Parthian control. The right to strike civic coinage — rare for a city this far east — came directly from that conquest, and issues naming Caracalla as co-Augustus place this piece early in that colonial minting sequence. The Greek titulature on the reverse reflects the bilingual administrative reality of the Severan east, where Latin imperial titles were routinely transliterated for Greek-speaking civic audiences.