Stater - Sauromates II Commodus

Sauromates II ruled the Bosporan Kingdom as a client of Rome, and this stater dates to a year when both Sauromates and Commodus held power simultaneously — the coin's dating by regnal year of the reigning Roman emperor was a deliberate political formality, not a convenience. The Bosporan kingdom had long since abandoned any pretense of independence from Rome, and the dual-authority coinage makes that arrangement explicit in metal.

Electrum composition by this period was heavily debased relative to earlier Bosporan issues, a degradation that had been creeping through the series since the mid-second century.