Medallion with busts of Gallienus and Salonina

Grouping portraits was an effective strategy for suggesting relationships between those represented. On the obverse of this gilded silver medallion, the emperor Gallienus, in military dress and wearing a laurel wreath, faces his wife, Salonina, whose head supports a crownlike diadem. The juxtaposition creates an impression of loving intimacy between the married couple. This double-portrait format was employed primarily on Roman medallions, special issues of large denomination that were sometimes struck to commemorate occasions such as imperial weddings, anniversaries, and births.Although the precise circumstances surrounding the creation of this medallion are not known, Gallienus's short, curly hair and beard point to a date between A.D. 253 and 260, when he reigned jointly with his father, Valerian. Gallienus's marriage to Salonina, already about a decade strong by the time he ascended the throne, was of considerable political advantage, since their sons, as potential heirs, promised to carry the dynasty into the future. The legend running around the edge of the medallion makes ex-plicit the message that the concordia of the imperial family was symbolic of the well-being of the entire Roman Empire.