Aspron Trachy - John III Doukas Thessalonica

John III Doukas Vatatzes recaptured Thessalonica from the Despotate of Epirus in 1246, and coinage struck there in his name followed almost immediately — a deliberate administrative assertion over a city that had briefly styled itself a rival imperial capital. The Thessalonica mint had operated under Epirote control for years, and its reactivation under Nicaean authority carried pointed political weight.

The aspron trachy in bronze represents the lower end of a bimetallic system increasingly debased from its original electrum standard — by this point the denomination was copper in all but name.