Obol - Shapur I

Shapur I's early coinage followed directly from the reforms of his father Ardashir I, who had revived Persian kingship after four centuries of Parthian rule and needed a coin series that announced the new dynasty's legitimacy without Hellenistic ambiguity. The obol denomination, inherited from that transitional moment, was already shrinking in practical importance by mid-reign as the drachm dominated commerce along Sasanian trade routes.

The Göbl I/1 classification places this among the earliest die groupings of Shapur's reign, before the iconographic program stabilized following his decisive campaigns against Rome — culminating in the capture of Emperor Valerian in 260 AD, the only Roman emperor ever taken prisoner in battle.