Sestertius - Kotys II

Kotys II ruled the Bosporan Kingdom as a client king under Roman suzerainty, and coins of his reign were issued under the dual dating system that synchronized the local Bosporan era with the regnal year — a bureaucratic habit that makes precise attribution possible where it would otherwise be guesswork. His reign falls within the broader Antonine period, when the kingdom functioned as a buffer state controlling access to the Black Sea grain trade that Rome depended on. The Bosporan copper issues of this period circulated in a confined regional economy with no pretense of broader imperial acceptance.