After the Western Roman Empire crushed under the pressure of the various Germanic invasions, Roman coinage came to an end. The Ostrogoths and the Visigoths, the Alemanni and the Frankish Merovingians started to issue their own coins; in the beginning these issues were mere imitations of Roman coins. These so-called pseudo imperial coins usually depicted the busts and names of Roman emperors. Frankish coins, however, often mentioned the name of the moneyer rather than that of an emperor – if the inscriptions were readable at all (on this coin they make no sense). The reverse shows a Christian cross on steps, as the Merovingians had become Christians around the end of the 5th century.