Good morning everyone,
I have this copper coin, which I would say is Byzantine.
It weighs 6.17 grams and has a diameter of 25 mm.
I have tried to identify it, but I am absolutely unable to say whether my classification is correct.
Could anyone help me?
Thank you.
MY ATTEMPT AT CLASSIFICATION
On the obverse there are two standing figures that could represent Romanitas and Imperium, or alternatively Empire and Church, or even collegial authorities (Senate / Roman People), flanking a large central Latin cross standing on a base representing Christ; the figures wear stylized ceremonial garments; the field is full and the edge irregular.
There is a legend, but it is illegible; I seem to make out N A.
On the reverse I see a legend arranged in four lines, which I think reads:
O R S (at the end another illegible character)
M R O M N I
N X R S S
R O M E (perhaps another character before, and very likely one after)
So the legend could be:
NOSTRIS
IMPERII ROMANI
IN XRSI
ROMAE
That is: NOSTRIS IMPERII ROMANI IN CHRISTI ROMAE
(Of our Roman Empire, in Christ, at Rome).
It should therefore be a local Romano‑Byzantine issue (Roman / senatorial milieu) from the second half of the 11th century, often described in the literature as a “Roman coin in the name of the Empire,” not imperial in the strict sense.
A coin minted in Rome in the 11th century, when the pope issued coinage as an ecclesiastical sovereign, while other Roman circles (sporadically) issued coinage that spoke the language of the Christian Roman Empire, without an emperor, claiming Rome as its natural seat.
An “ideological Roman” coin, without pope or emperor, using imperial language and iconography of Byzantine tradition to assert Rome as the seat of the Christian Roman Empire.