 This practice could have been inspired by encounters with Roman coins in the names of empresses.It is also possible, though less likely, that the appearance of Irene on Byzantine coinage led Offa's queen to place her image on coins as well.Certainly Cynethryth emerges from surviving evidence as a formidable individual, who regularly witnessed contemporary charters immediately after her husband, was responsible for the running of his household and survived him to become a powerful abbess.