Coinage
Coinage plays a central role in the construction of power for female Byzantine empresses. Since the general public had access to these objects on a daily basis, it was a constant confirmation of who had the power. Furthermore, money and power are intrinsically linked which generates a connection between the empress, her material wealth, and therefore her unparalleled power.
The coin of Aelia Flaccilla was an important moment for female rulers in the Byzantine empire because it exists as the first time a woman was shown wearing a diadem identical to the emperor. Her reign alongside her husband Theodosius I occurred nearly at the very start of what is now known as the Byzantine Empire as they ruled just fifty years after Constantine. Therefore, it demonstrates that the jeweled crown was not just a representation of femininity, but a token of a shared authority with the emperor. The depiction of her wearing the crown that matched exactly to that of the emperor promotes her status to an equal partner. The partnership cements her rulership in her own right because she is not a secondary component of the imperial family. Aelia Flaccilla is also depicted wearing the paludamentum, the traditional military garment. Wearing an imperial costume that is so closely associated with masculinity in the relationship to military as well as the emperor, demonstrates an assimilation of imperial attributes that were formerly separated. The subversion of imperial masculine power for the female ruler demonstrates that the goal was to establish credibility amongst the general public through daily visual representations.
Empress Irene’s sole representation on the bronze coin is essential to understanding imperial female rule. The process in which Irene rose to power was hard fought and tedious. She reigned alongside her husband Leo IV until 780 and acted as an interim ruler until her son Constantine VI came of age to rule. However, she was resistant to his impending rule and they even acted as co-rulers for a number of years. During this period, they were depicted on coins together, demonstrating that even her male son could not overtake the power she had accumulated over the years. After a long power struggle between mother and son, she was finally able to manipulate and call for his arrest which ended with her order for him to be blinded for plotting against the emperor. The consolidation of her rule appeared in the form of a coin that had only her image on both the front and the back. She is the only female ruler to depict herself on both the front and the back in the same imperial depiction. Empress Irene faces the viewer in a portrait style in order to portray her imperial dress, which includes the pearl diadem, along with the scepter and globus cruciger. The scepter is an important signifier of her rule because it is a token of the empire itself which heightens her rule to the level of divinity.