AE Follis AE4, A.D. 388-395, Nicomedia, 13.9mm, 1.03g, 0°, RIC IX 45b.1.
Obv: DN THEODOSIVS PF AVG. Pearl-diademed, draped and cuirassed bust right.
Rev: SALVS REIPVBLICAE. Victory advancing left, holding trophy and dragging captive; SMNA in ex.
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Flavius Theodosius, commonly known as Theodosius I or Theodosius the Great, was Roman Emperor from 379 to 395. Theodosius was the last emperor to rule over both the eastern and the western halves of the Roman Empire. During his reign, the Goths secured control of Illyricum after the Gothic War and established their homeland south of the Danube within the empire's borders. In the last years of Theodosius' reign, one of the emerging leaders of the Goths, named Alaric, participated in Theodosius' campaign against Eugenius in 394, only to resume his rebellious behavior against Theodosius' son and eastern successor, Arcadius, shortly after Theodosius' death.

Theodosius issued decrees that effectively made Christianity the official state religion of the Roman Empire and he is recognized by the Eastern Orthodox Church as Saint Theodosius. By decree in 391, Theodosius ended the subsidies that had still trickled to some remnants of Greco-Roman civic Paganism. The eternal fire in the Temple of Vesta in the Roman Forum was extinguished, and the Vestal Virgins were disbanded. Taking the auspices and practicing witchcraft were to be punished. Pagan members of the Senate in Rome appealed to him to restore the Altar of Victory in the Senate House; he refused. After the last Olympic Games in 393, it is believed that Theodosius cancelled the games although there is no proof of that in the official records of the Roman Empire, and the reckoning of dates by Olympiads soon came to an end.

Theodosius died, after suffering from a disease involving severe edema, in Milan on 17 January 395. Ambrose organized and managed Theodosius's lying in state in Milan. Ambrose delivered a panegyric titled De Obitu Theodosii before Stilicho and Honorius in which Ambrose detailed the suppression of heresy and paganism by Theodosius. Theodosius was finally buried in Constantinople on 8 November 395.