ROMAN AND BYZANTINE COINS Justinian II, first reign, 685-695. Solidus (Gold, 20mm, 4.37g 6), Constantinople, 692-695. IhS CRISTDS REX REGNANTIuM Draped bust of Christ facing, with long hair and full beard, raising right hand in benediction and holding book of Gospels in his left; behind head, cross. Rev. D IuSTINIANuS SERu ChRISTI Γ / CONOP Justin­ian II, crowned, bearded and wearing loros, standing fac­ing, holding cross potent on base and two steps in his right hand and akakia in his left. DOC 7c. MIB 8a. SB 1248. A wonderful piece, beautifully struck, very sharp and with a superb portrait of Christ. Edge bang on the reverse, other­wise , extremely fine. This coin bears the first numismatic portrait of Christ, and it re­mains one of the finest ever made. It shows Christ Pantocrator and was copied from a representation found in the Imperial Pal­ace that was itself based on the head of the Zeus of Phidias from Olympia. The decision to place Christ on the coinage was a mo­mentous one: until this point the Moslem Arab conquerors of the Byzantine East and Africa had been content to use Byzantine sol­idi as their sole gold coinage. The appearance of a bust of Christ, however, was unacceptable to them and led to the introduction of a new, national coinage, first with a ‘standing Caliph’, based on the figure of Justinian II, in 693/4 and then the non-figural epigraphic dinars that began in 696/7 (A.H. 77).