KINGS OF PONTOS. Mithradates VI Eupator, circa 120-63 BC. Tetradrachm (Silver, 30 mm, 16.54 g, 1 h), uncertain mint in Pontos. Year 210 of the Bithyno-Pontic era, 8th month = May 92 BC. Diademed head of Mithradates VI to right. Rev. BAΣIΛEΩΣ / EYΠATOPOΣ Pegasos grazing left; to left, star-in-crescent (Pontic royal badge); to right, EΣ above monogram of Dionysos (?); in exergue, H; all within Dionysiac wreath of ivy and fruit. Callataÿ D31/R7. SNG Copenhagen 234 (same obverse die). SNG von Aulock 6 (same obverse die). Beautifully toned and with a wonderful idealized portrait. A few light marks on the obverse, otherwise, nearly extremely fine.


This coin is part of a brief but highly interesting emission by the magistrate Dionysos (?) in April and May 92 BC, which omits the king's name and only provides his title, basileus, and his most common epithet, Eupator, on the reverse. Unfortunately, the background of this extraordinary issue is unclear, but it is worth noting that its date corresponds to the campaign of Sokrates Chrestos, who, with the support of Mithradates VI, invaded Bithynia in 92 BC to seize the throne of his half-brother Nikomedes IV. Unfortunately for Mithradates and his Bithynian ally, the Roman senate intervened and reinstalled Nikomedes in 91/0, as it also did with Ariobarzanes I of Cappadocia, whom Mithradates had likewise expelled from his kingdom. As it turned out, these defeats inflicted upon Mithradates VI by Rome were just the beginning of decades-long hostilities between Pontos and Rome, which would soon erupt in open war and the Asiatic Vespers of 88 BC.