Stater with Epsilon

The Nervii were among the most militarily formidable of the Belgic tribes — Caesar singled them out in the Gallic Wars as nearly destroying his forces at the Battle of the Sabis in 57 BC, a near-catastrophe that left him badly shaken. Their coinage belongs to the abstract, highly distorted tradition derived ultimately from Macedonian gold staters that filtered through Gaul over several generations of copying, each iteration straying further from the prototype. The epsilon element of this type is a regional marker that helps distinguish Nervian production from closely related Belgic issues.