Tetradrachm - Diocletianus Alexandria

By the time Diocletian's Alexandrian tetradrachms were being struck in this period, the coin had shed nearly all its silver content — potin issues like this one were the end result of two centuries of progressive debasement that had reduced what was once a prestige silver denomination to little more than a bronze coin with a trace wash. Alexandria continued issuing tetradrachms as a closed currency system, meaning Roman denarii and other imperial coinage were officially excluded from Egyptian circulation, a monetary isolation policy the Romans maintained from Augustus onward. Diocletian abolished the system entirely around 296 AD, integrating Egypt into the imperial coinage network for the first time.