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Product Description
This Roman Byzantine Empire bronze follis coin was minted in Nicomedia by Emperor Maurice, during his 6th year of reign, 587 - 588 A.D.. The obverse is worn but shows a facing image of emperor Maurice wearing a wreath crown and holding a cross. The reverse shows a large M with NIKO below indicating the Nicomedia mint, and a symbol on the right of the M, meaning the 6th year of Maurice's reign.
HISTORY
Maurice was Byzantine emperor from 582 to 602 AD, and the last member of the Justinian dynasty. A successful general, Maurice was chosen as heir and son-in-law by his predecessor Tiberius II.
Maurice's reign was troubled by almost constant warfare. After he became emperor, he brought the war with Sasanian Persia to a victorious conclusion. The empire's eastern border in the South Caucasus was vastly expanded and, for the first time in nearly two centuries, the Romans were no longer obliged to pay the Persians thousands of pounds of gold annually for peace.
Maurice's successes on battlefields and in foreign policy were counterbalanced by mounting financial difficulties of the empire. Maurice responded with several unpopular measures which alienated both the army and the general populace. In 602, a dissatisfied officer named Phocas usurped the throne, having Maurice and his six sons executed. This event would prove a disaster for the empire, sparking a twenty-six-year war with a resurgent Sassanid Persia which would leave both empires devastated prior to the Muslim conquests.
Maurice's reign is a relatively well-documented era of late antiquity, in particular by the historian Theophylact Simocatta. The Strategikon, a manual of war which influenced European and Middle Eastern military traditions for well over a millennium, is traditionally attributed to Maurice.