The FEL TEMP REPARATIO ("happy times are returning") coinage was launched in 348 AD to mark the 1,100th anniversary of Rome's founding, a massive empire-wide issue struck simultaneously across nearly every mint. Arelate — modern Arles — was one of the western mints that produced this phoenix type, symbolically chosen to evoke Rome's cyclical renewal at a moment when the empire was anything but stable: Constans controlled the west, Constantius II the east, and the two brothers were already drifting toward the confrontation that would end with Constans' murder in early 350.
The FEL TEMP REPARATIO ("happy times are returning") coinage was launched in 348 AD to mark the 1,100th anniversary of Rome's founding, a massive empire-wide issue struck simultaneously across nearly every mint. Arelate — modern Arles — was one of the western mints that produced this phoenix type, symbolically chosen to evoke Rome's cyclical renewal at a moment when the empire was anything but stable: Constans controlled the west, Constantius II the east, and the two brothers were already drifting toward the confrontation that would end with Constans' murder in early 350.