Tetradrachm - Cleopatra Thea Sole Reign

Cleopatra Thea's sole reign lasted barely two years before her son Antiochus VIII forced her to drink the poisoned cup she had prepared for him — one of antiquity's more pointed reversals of fortune. These tetradrachms were struck at Ptolemais-Ake, the sole mint operating under her authority during this period, making the issue geographically constrained and mintage relatively limited by Seleucid standards.

She had previously appeared as a consort figure on the coinage of three successive husbands. Coins bearing her name alone, without a male co-ruler, mark an explicit assertion of autonomous dynastic power unprecedented among Seleucid queens.