See full images - free registration
Continue with Google - no registration! or register with email

Why register? Just to keep bots out of our catalog. Your email stays private - we will never share it or send you anything uninvited. We guarantee you that!

Tetradrachm - Zenobia and Selene Alexandria

Issuer Palmyrene Empire (Roman splinter states)
Year 272
Type Log in to see details
Value Log in to see details
Currency Log in to see details
Composition Log in to see details
Weight Log in to see details
Diameter 20 mm
Thickness Log in to see details
Shape Log in to see details
Technique Log in to see details
Orientation Log in to see details
Engraver(s) Log in to see details
In circulation to Log in to see details
Reference(s) Log in to see details
Obverse description Draped bust of Queen Zenobia (Septimia Zenobia) facing right, her hair elaborately coifed and bound, wearing a diadem and imperial robes. The bust is rendered in a provincial Alexandrian style, with bold, somewhat stylized features characteristic of late third-century Egyptian coinage. The encircling Greek legend reads ϹЄΠΤΙΜΙΑ ΖΗ ΝΟΒΙΑ ϹЄΒ, identifying the queen by her full name and title. The coin's fabric is typical of Alexandrian potin tetradrachms of the period, with a slightly irregular flan.
Obverse script Log in to see details
Obverse lettering Log in to see details
Reverse description Log in to see details
Reverse script Greek
Reverse lettering Log in to see details
Edge Log in to see details
Mint Log in to see details
Mintage Log in to see details
Additional information

Zenobia's Egyptian coinage was struck during her son Vaballathus's nominal co-rule with Aurelian — a fiction that collapsed entirely in 272 when she dropped the pretense, declared herself Augusta, and issued coins in her own name. The Alexandrian mint, then under Palmyrene control, produced this issue in the final months before Aurelian's campaign decisively ended the empire at the Battle of Immae.

Surviving examples are scarce by any measure. The mint's output under Palmyrene authority spanned less than two years.

YOU MAY ALSO LIKE