Struck in the opening months of Vespasian's reign, this issue belongs to the eastern mint production — almost certainly Antioch — that supplied the legions still active in the Jewish War. Vespasian himself was commanding those forces when Nero died and the Year of the Four Emperors collapsed into civil war. The CONCORDIA reverse message was pointed: after Galba, Otho, and Vitellius had each destroyed themselves in turn, projecting harmony was political necessity, not ceremony.
RIC II.1 1400 is assigned to the Antioch mint on the basis of stylistic die work and silver fineness distinct from Rome's output of the same period.
Struck in the opening months of Vespasian's reign, this issue belongs to the eastern mint production — almost certainly Antioch — that supplied the legions still active in the Jewish War. Vespasian himself was commanding those forces when Nero died and the Year of the Four Emperors collapsed into civil war. The CONCORDIA reverse message was pointed: after Galba, Otho, and Vitellius had each destroyed themselves in turn, projecting harmony was political necessity, not ceremony.
RIC II.1 1400 is assigned to the Antioch mint on the basis of stylistic die work and silver fineness distinct from Rome's output of the same period.