Nummus - Valens SECVRITAS REIPVBLICAE, Thessalonica

Valens ruled the Eastern Empire from Constantinople but never fully secured it — his reign ended at Adrianople in 378, where a Gothic coalition annihilated a Roman field army and killed the emperor himself, one of the most consequential military disasters in late imperial history. The SECVRITAS REIPVBLICAE type was struck throughout this period with almost mechanical regularity across multiple mints, the slogan increasingly at odds with actual conditions on the Danube frontier.

The Thessalonica mint was particularly active under Valens, functioning as a critical western supply point for Eastern campaigns. RIC IX 27B places this issue within the second officina of that mint.