AR27 - Caracalla ΔΗΜΑΡΧ ΕΞ ΥΠΑ ΤΟ Δ

Carrhae occupies a particular place in Roman memory as the site of Crassus's catastrophic defeat by the Parthians in 53 BC, a wound the Romans never quite stopped picking at. By Caracalla's reign the city had become a key frontier garrison town, and its mint produced civic coinage under the watchful eye of a dynasty obsessed with the eastern campaigns. Caracalla himself died near Carrhae in 217 AD, killed by a soldier while relieving himself on the road to Edessa — an inglorious end for an emperor who had spent years cultivating a martial image on the very coins this mint was striking.