Tetradrachm In the name of Alexander III, Messembria

Messembria — the Greek colonial city on the Black Sea coast of Thrace, modern Nesebar in Bulgaria — struck posthumous Alexandrine tetradrachms well into the second century BC, long after the Macedonian kingdom itself had fragmented. These issues were not Macedonian state coinages but autonomous civic productions, minted under the city's own authority using the universally trusted Alexandrine type as a commercial currency for Black Sea trade networks. Price 991 is among the later Messeimbrian issues, identifiable by its specific monograms and control marks that distinguish it from the dozens of other mints producing identical-looking coins across the Hellenistic world.