SELEUCID KINGDOM — Demetrios II Nikator. Second reign, 129 – 125 BC.

SELEUCID KINGDOM — Demetrios II Nikator. Second reign, 129 – 125 BC. AR Tetradrachm (29 mm, 16.56 g, 5 h), Antioch on the Orontes, civic Year 185 = 128/7 BC.Obv. Bearded, diademed head of Demetrios II right; hair in loose curls, diadem ties falling behind; fine pearl border. Rev. ΒΑΣΙΛΕΩΣ / ΔΗΜΗΤΡΙΟΥ — Zeus Nikephoros enthroned left, himation draped over lower body; right hand extended, holding small Nike who crowns the king’s name; left arm rests on sceptre; date ΕΠΙ ΡΠΕ (= SE 185) in exergue; control monogram in outer left field. SC 2131.5a; HGC 9, 1160; cf. CSE Demetrios II Second Reign, 78. Struck on a broad flan with softly lustrous surfaces; portrait in high relief, Zeus and Nike sharply detailed. NGC Ch XF , Strike 5/5, Surface 4/5. Previously encapsulated, Cert # 4877641-010, with tag.

Struck in the opening years of Demetrios II’s dramatic second reign, this issue belongs to the short interval after the king’s surprise return from nine years of Parthian captivity. The flinty, world-weary portrait — now fully bearded, a far cry from the clean-shaven youth of his first coinage — projects both maturity and legitimacy at a moment when Antioch was reeling from civil war and foreign invasion. On the reverse, Zeus enthroned with Nike recalls the imagery of Demetrios I and of Seleukid founder Seleukos I, proclaiming dynastic continuity even as real power slipped toward local strong-men and Ptolemaic interlopers. The date formula ΕΠΙ ΡΠΕ (Year 185 of the Seleukid Era) fixes the striking to 128/7 BC, barely a year before the king would perish in battle near Damascus. Coins of this brief revival therefore mark the last confident rally of Seleukid authority in Syria and stand as tangible witnesses to the kingdom’s final, tumultuous decade.